


Songtale

by Ngrey651



Category: Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Action/Adventure, Fantasy, Musicals
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-01-06
Updated: 2017-05-13
Packaged: 2018-09-15 08:42:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 8
Words: 28,799
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9227189
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ngrey651/pseuds/Ngrey651
Summary: Neil Elliot Soul of Integrity, and allowed himself to die to make up for the wrongs he'd done in the Underground. Upon finding he's been given a second chance, he at first swears to stay away from Mt. Ebott...until he learns kids are missing. So down into the Underground he'll go...into a world where everyone has a song in their heart...and on their lips? Musical.





	1. The Performance Begins

_Neil Elliot, age 11, could remember the moment he realized he had the power to control time itself._

_It had been the day of an enormous test on Native Americans and their interactions with the pilgrims. His biggest bully, Tom, who happened to be rather tall and strong for his age and had decided that because Neil was in the ballet, he was a wimpy little girly-girl who needed a thumping right good. Had they been in a school with a sports team, Tom would have fit the "jerk jock" role to a T if not for the fact that Tom was too lazy to do sports, and was more interested in playing nonstop "Pokemon" than Football._

_Sometimes Neil suspected that Tom, deep down, might actually have wanted to do the things Neil did. That maybe Tom was...different. In a particular way. But instead of just owning up to it, he denied it and took out the frustrations that resulted on Neil, the child who DID something you would expect a...different...child to do. Different. Yeah._

_He was from Kentucky, and his father was a dye-in-the-wool Conservative. The word 'gay' was not ever allowed to even enter his head. He was too afraid to let it._

_But nevertheless, Neil was sure Tom thought he was a homosexual, and so he'd beaten the crap out of him the day before, and so Neil was soon freaking out, hands gripping his head, fingers digging through blonde hair as he squirmed in his seat and whimpered pitifully, staring down at the test._

_He'd spent the entire night before being sore in bed, nursing what felt like a pair of broken ribs...and he hadn't studied at all. In fact, he was tempted to write "I wish the Native Americans had ALL died so we wouldn't have to write about them", but that awful, meanspirited thought immediately died a horrible death when he realized the true issue._

_Tom. That...that dumb bully..._

_Head held in his hands, the clock had been ticking down. Tick...tock. Tick...tock, Neil had stared up at it as it kept continuously ticking against soft blue walls. He had on a white, well-buttoned, longsleeve shirt and it was being stained with sweat as his soft blue eyes gazed down at the paper below him, filled with nervousness, fear...and soon frustration that was reaching a boiling point. His mind drawing a blank, his mouth hanging open, the volcano inside him finally burst as he found himself finally letting out a scream._

**_"THIS IS SO UNFAIR, IF HE HADN'T-"_ **

_And then, just like that, Neil was on the sidewalk close to the convenience store, realizing he was in the same spot he'd been in before Tom had popped out, seen him, and decided to beat him up for what he was. He had been given a second chance._

_This...was the power of RESET._

_He could go back an entire 24 hours. JUST Twenty Four. No more. No less. And when you could RESET, well..._

_It helped a lot. He began to ace all the tests. He knew when Tom or any bully was going to try to get him. He knew EVERY response to make that would make his dad or his teachers happy. He, a kid who now regularly wore a ballet tutu to class just because he could, was quickly becoming the most popular kid in Simsbury's elementary school, and 204X was going to be a good year for him._

_Until the day he fell into the Underground, knocking himself out, and being unconcious for over a day and a half._

_He'd been found by someone so sweet. So loving. The "Goat-Mom", Miss Toriel. A white-furred, faintly goat-like monster with a face that radiated warmth, faintly ornate robes of purple and white, and twinkling blue eyes even softer than his. She'd welcomed him into her home, fed him, cared for him, and he'd spent many wonderful weeks with the former Queen of the Monster Kingdom._

_But he missed his school. Missed his Dad._

_...missed...missed the leaves of New England, and the way the wind would blow them past you on a nice day._

_And from that desire to just get out, he'd heard HER talking to him. Seen her presence in the old room she'd once slept in. Chara, a girl who'd landed in the Underground far before him. Chara, who had hated Humanity._

_Chara, who told him his RESET could grow powerful enough to skip even further back in time as long as he grew in power...through killing monsters._

_At first, he hadn't wanted to, but the desire to go home had been great. Bit by bit, he'd done worse and worse. Killed more and more as an exhilarating, almost erotic feeling swept through him as he swept through the Ruins, then into the town of Snowdin, and then into the caves of Waterfall, where he'd met his greatest rival, the heroine Undyne, Head of the Royal Guard._

_He'd pulled out all the stops, and had watched her transform. He'd died time and time again at her hands, but had, at long last, with Chara's aid, won. And then he'd watched her...die. So...so very slowly. Dissolving right in front of him, goopily, messily, pieces of her lingering on him as she turned slowly into soupy dust._

_And he had screamed in horror and disgust. He'd felt so dirty. And he'd sworn...to never...ever...do that again._

_He had RESET. Made it better. And in the end, he'd faced down Asgore, the King of the Monsters, who also knew of the power to RESET. After all, Asgore's own Father had claimed human souls in the great War of Humans and Monsters, he'd been able to do miracles on the battlefield, all because he'd tapped into the power of "DETERMINATION" that Human Souls possessed._

_So he wasn't surprised when Neil had approached him and said..._

_"...Asgore, you've killed me ten times before."_

_And Asgore had nodded pitifully...killing once more, Neil deciding that this time?_

_He wasn't going to RESET._

_But then?_

_Neil had seen it playing out before his soul's eyes. The possibilities of a hundred different timelines, everyone in the Underground's hopes and dreams were all playing out around her. Neil could see, she could SEE what had been, what was, what would be, in every possible way. Neil could see his own death, a death coming from a thousand different ways. And then...young Frisk. The half Asian, half American child had saved them all, crossing the Barrier that seperated the Kingdom of Monsters in Mount Ebott from the Surface, making everything right. Neil had waited for the end, waiting for his soul to pass on, and he'd thought, perhaps..._

_Was this it? Salvation? Everything had gone bright and beautiful and shining, and pure light had swarmed through his vision. He'd felt so warm, and happy, and he thought...is this Heaven?_

_In a way, yes. Because when he awoke..._

_He could feel the soft winds of New England blowing against his face, making his blonde hair waft about slightly. He could see the red and orange and yellow leaves of New England's fall dancing through the sky above him. He could feel the grass on the slopes of Mount Ebott below his body as he rose up, glancing about. Neil Elliot was once again outside of the Underground, away from the cave opening he'd fallen into, and back home. Back home in Simsbury. Back on the Surface._

_And he knew exactly where to go._

_He'd raced down the street, the sun beginning to set as he bolted fast as he could. His father had been pacing up and down the front porch, cop cars surrounding his yellow-painted house, his dad chewing on his lip as his neat blonde hair was a mess, his moustache twitching and his button-down shirt matted with sweat. He'd been waiting hours. Neil had evidently gone missing after attending a party he was FAR too young for, and the cops had no idea when they'd be able to get a search party out-_

_And then they'd seen him._

_"DAD!" Neil had cried out, racing to his father as his dad had deeply embraced him._

_"Oh thank God you're alive." His father had whispered, shaking slightly, all a-quiver with relief, sorrow and joy. "Thank God, thank God, thank God. I don't know what I'd do if you were gone..."_

_"I'm not going anywhere, Dad." Neil had whispered back. "I promise."_

...

...

...

...The sun was high in the sky on Saturday as Neil let out a yawn, and stretched his arms, standing out on the front porch. The wind was blowing nicely through the air, bathing over him as he turned about a bit before hopping down the steps. He looked out along the road, seeing the houses lining the streets, broken up by natural barriers of trees and shrubberies, and the occasional stone fence left over from Colonial times. He smiled softly as he made his way down the road, walking nonchalantly as the wind kissed over his face, and the smells of New England wafted through the air.

_**New England life does have its charms! Rolling hills and steady breeze!** _

_**Nothing ever happens here...few are those that do not fall beneath its spell!** _

_**And here within my little home...I'm prosperous and confident!** _

_**I'm all filled up with certainty! Controlling Time's a wonderful ability!** _

Neil sighed as he finally arrived at the large field just down the road, plopping down in the center of it, closing his eyes as he rested his head on his hands, the wind continuing to gently blow through his hair. His words echoed through the air, dancing along the wind just as smoothly as the leaves...

_**I came here, had been so scared, now life opens before my eyes!** _

_**Soft nights under starry skies! And every room has...scenic viiiiiews...** _

Unbeknownst to him, a form was also spread out, lying down in a field. But this was a field of snow, his blank, empty sockets staring up at the sky, his voice soft and thoughtful as the weight of the future began to hang down upon him. His blue jacketed form was warm enough, but on the inside...he felt as cold as the snow against his short, stubby frame.

**one by one they'd fallen in...one by one they all arrived!**

**each one of them's been captured by the time I'd gotten home,**

**just time enough to seeeeee...**

He cringed sadly.

**horrors pass before my face...because we're trapped inside this place!**

**but what can I do anyway? come what may. things will not be otherwise...**

He rose up, bony hands stuffed inside of his jacket pocket as he slowly sauntered down the natural forest path, heading in the direction of home with his head bowed.

**i came here, a package deal, the future's clear before my eyes!**

**cold nights under starless skies, and endless dark filling up my lonely rooooom...**

Slowly but surely, both he and Neil made their way into the local stores. A candy bar for each, a smile and a nod, before making their way back down the road. A faint wind bathed over the two, but for one, it just made them sigh in sorrow, rather than in delight as the other did. At long last, they headed to a bench not far from the store, plopping down and beginning to eat.

That is, until he saw what was on the corner of his eye. A "Missing" poster placed up on a nearby lamplight. One of several. Neil approached, pulling it off, then pulling off another as he looked over the pictures, one of an Asian American girl with a bandanna over her head, another a sad-looking young African American orphan, another a glasses-wearing, nice little girl with frizzy hair, and a final poster that showed a long-haired teenage girl with a large cowboy hat.

In that instant, Time began to pass as people slowly passed by them, all of time seeming to slow as they just let the moment invade their every sense, and closed their eyes, deep in thought and reflection.

_**Time may be clearly on my side...** _

**"time is on the cavern's side..."**

_**But where do all these children go?** _

**"the river shifts, the cliffs erode..."**

_**I wonder, do I want to know?** _

**"the engineers do what they can..."**

_**Seems every week another one just...** _

**"but every day another house just..."**

**_Runs awaaaaay..._ "slides awaaaay..."**

**_I came here, had been so scared, now life opens before my eyes! Soft nights under starry skies! And every room has...scenic viiiiiews..._ "i came here, a package deal, the future's clear before my eyes! cold nights under starless skies, and endless dark filling up my lonely rooooom..."**

Sans the Skeleton quietly sighed, hanging his head as Neil hung his own head, looking shamefully at the candy bar he'd left behind, tossing it away. Enjoying a friggin' Butterfinger when kids he knew and recognized were missing?!

What should he do? He KNEW where they'd gone, deep down...or at least, suspected it. He suspected they'd fallen into the Mountain.

"If I just stay out of it, the future will be changed, they won't get the Souls they need. They won't be able to break out, unless...something else happens." Neil cringed. "What if Flowey or a less nice monster than Asgore decides enough waiting, I'll just take one and go get more? What if another kid besides me goes down and then Frisk follows after?"

He bit into his lip. "What am I supposed to do?" He wondered aloud. "...what's the right thing to do?"

Deep down...

He knew the answer. The only answer he could think of.

Go back down into the darkness and the deep.

Return to the Underground. Return...to where he'd first been murdered.

...

...

...

...the sun was high in the sky as Neil Elliot began to descend down the large rope he'd tied to a tree outside the cave, inching his way deeper and deeper into the Underground. As he sank down further and further, he felt a soft, tingling sensation bathe over him, and he saw a faint shimmer as he looked up. Sure enough, he could see it; he had passed through one side of the Barrier that kept all Monsterkind down in the Underground, only now was it visible, now that he'd slid on through.

He kept making his way down the rope ladder, his face flooded with deep, agonizing guilt. He'd broken his promise to his Father. He'd SWORN not to go back, promised to never leave and now?

Now he was breaking that promise. Sure, it was in the name of saving other kids, but...still...you weren't ever supposed to break a promise. His face was flush, his blonde hair wafting about in the wind blowing about the cavern as he shamefully descended down deeper into the dark recesses of the cave, touching down, at long last, in a field of soft, thick, golden flowers. He felt over them with his hands, kneeling down on the grass in his Pink Tutu, his blue eyes gazing at the gold just as a flower arched up not too far away, its white face cheery and grinning as it bounced about.

"Howdy-howdy-howdy, I'm your buddy Flowey! And I'm here to explain how we do things around here!" Flowey the Flower proclaimed in a faintly musical voice as Neil blinked a bit. Something about Flowey's tone sounded even...odder than normal. Neil recognized the would-be prince, the transformed Asriel Dreemurr, former Prince of the Underground. He'd know that voice anywhere. Know those petals anywhere. Yet...there was something new. Something too...bouncy. Yes, bouncy!

"Are...you alright?" Neil asked quietly, tilting his head a bit, looking confused. "You don't sound normal. You sound a bit too...cheery. Like you're getting ready for a big performance!"

"All the world's a stage!" Flowey proclaimed with a laugh. "Don't you wanna be my friend?"

"Um..."

"Well TOO BAD!" Flowey roared, his face contorting, turning dark and foul as Neil realized he was in deep trouble, bullets forming, made of pure white, seed-like energy as they sailed at Neil, who dove to the side, pirouetting out of the line of fire as Flowey cackled with devilish delight.

_**When the Devil is too busy, And death's a bit too much!** _

_**They call on me by name, you see, for my special touch!** _

_**To the gentlemen, I'm Miss Fortune, to the ladies, I'm Sir Prize!** _

_**But call me by any name! Anyway, it's all the same!** _

Neil dove to the side, Flowey bouncing back and forth, laughing as he continued to sing, and oddly cheery, yet sinister music filling the air.

**_I'm the fly in your soup,_ **

**_I'm the pebble in your shoe,_ **

**_I'm the pea beneath your bed,_ **

**_I'm a bump on every head!_** He laughed, shooting a vine forward from the ground as it managed to whack Neil across the head, knocking him back before ANOTHER vine grabbed around his leg and made him trip, flopping onto the cold dirt floor as Neil gasped in pain, Flowey sneering.

I _ **'m the peel on which you slip,**_

_**I'm a pin in every hip,** _

_**I'm the thorn in your side** _

_**Makes you wriggle and writhe!** _

"What is your PROBLEM?!" Neil snapped, managing to roll away JUST in time to avoid bullets that slammed into where he'd been moments ago.

_**And it's so easy when you're evil!** _

_**This is the life, you see!** _

_**The Devil tips his hat to me!** _

_**I do it all because I'm evil!** _

_**And I do it all for free...** _

_**Your tears are all the pay I'll ever neeeeed!**_ Flowey cackled in delight, bullets surrounding Neil as the blonde-haired little ballerina gasped in horror...

But then, salvation. A burning fireball slammed into Flowey like a football and he was sent sailing through the darkness as a familiar, goat-headed figure walked towards him, her arms spread wide.

"Oh, sweet child." She crooned, Neil's eyes widening at the sight of her.

"Toriel?"

"Why, yes! That's my name! Have we met before? I feel you are so... _familiar_." Toriel admitted as she knelt by Neil, passing a hand over him as green, balmy healing magic bathed over his frame and she gently lifted him up with one hand, leading him down the path. "When humans fall down here, I...often feel like I know them. In any case, sweet child, it's so nice to finally meet you. _**Now welcome to your home!**_ " She proclaimed, gesturing all around as she led him down the long purple hallway, Neil realizing that something gentle and soft was playing around him, music swelling through the air as he realized something was very...VERY different about the Underground.

"My home?" He asked, blinking a bit, wanting to see what was going to happen.

_**"Safe and sound, underground they'll never reach you! And you'll never be alone!"**_ Toriel sang out, reaching down and lifting him up as they finally reached her home, Toriel twirling him about as she circled around the singular tree outside her quaint, purple home as Neil tilted his head a bit.

"Are you...bursting into song?"

_**"We'll live a life just you and I! Now settle down, have a slice of pie! I'll stay right by your side!"** _ Toriel insisted as she brought him inside the yellow-carpeted home she had, the walls a soft yellow and the carpet as cozy as fresh grass. The kitchen was filled with various baked cookies and pies, Toriel cutting up a slice of Butterscotch-Cinnamon Pie and handing it to Neil on a little plate with cute, adorable little red hearts encircling the inner plate.

Neil took it, looking up at her as she looked down at him, chuckling a bit as she realized that a boy was actually wearing a tutu and ballerina shoes...and didn't seem to care one bit. She ruffled his hair with her clawed hands, smiling tenderly down upon him. **_"I only wish to see you smile! You're such an INTERESTING child. Now there's no need to fight!"_**

She knelt down onto one knee, taking one of his hands, clasping them tightly in her own, staring deep into his eyes, pleading softly.

_**"Just promise me...that you'll never leave!"** _

Neil blinked a bit, stammering slightly. "I-I mean, I...I think I should go, Ms. Toriel..."

She picked him up, sweeping around the kitchen, making towards the living room as a soft fire billowed gently in the chimney. _**"Oh sweet child, it's so nice to finally meet you. Now welcome to your home! Safe and sound, underground they'll never reach you! And you'll never be alone!"**_

She put him down, heading over to the bookcase, cheerily pulling out a large book that read "72 Facts About Snails", waving the green book about in the air. _**"My only wish is just to reach you, so many snail facts I could teach you!"**_

"Miss Toriel, I really, REALLY should go..." Neil murmured quietly as Toriel flinched, looking away as if ashamed, clutching the book tightly to her chest.

_"Stop asking me to leave."_ She mumbled softly before quickly putting the book back, and kneeling down by Neil, rubbing over his head. _**"Don't run away, just stay inside, don't live a life of genocide! Can't you just stay with me?"**_

Neil walked over to the table, putting the pie piece down and biting his lip as he turned back to Toriel, then turned to look outside the windows. Sure enough, a large group of familiar, froggy monsters..."Froggits"...were all outside, harmonizing all at once as Toriel got on her knees, clasping Neil's hands in hers, eyes almost brimming with tears...

_**"Just promise me...that you'll never leave! Why can't you see...this life was meant to beeee?"** _ Toriel begged, Neil hesitating.

"Miss Toriel..." He murmured.

**_"Oh sweet child, it's so nice to finally meet you. Now welcome to your home! Safe and sound, underground they'll never reach you! And you'll never be alone!"_** The Monsters outside began to sing, other monsters now joining in the chorus, heads bouncing back and forth as Toriel looked Neil over.

_**"You look so much like someone I used to care for...but now they've gone away! A life of darkness is bound to try and tempt you! So promise you won't stray!"** _

Her arms deeply embraced him, her body soft and warm, smelling like pie and fresh milk as he felt her soft tears gently trickle down onto his shoulders.

_**"Please promise meeeee..."** _


	2. Another Performer?

Neil Elliot had not been sure of what to say when "Goat Mom" had embraced him. Not sure of what to make of the deep hug that enveloped him now, of her broken voice, pleading with him to stay. And he'd looked at the soft tears trickling down her furry white cheeks, feeling guilt creep into his heart as a worried look came onto his face. His soft blue eyes looked at her as he struggled to think of what to say to her pouring her heart out to him...

In song.

"You...have a lovely voice." He confessed.

Toriel blinked a bit, slowly letting him go from the hug and instead carefully clasping his shoulders, looking into his face with a small smile. "Th-thank you." She said, wiping her eyes before nodding. "My husband and I were both Nose Nuzzle champs AND the Head Duet Duo during the entire 1990's." The soft-faced ex-monarch explained as her eyes filled with warm memories. "We swept all the best awards, especially in '99. I remember, the floodlights bathed over us as soft rose petals wafted down from above, onto the stage we stood upon as everyone cheered and yelled and whooped and hollered. Our darling Chara and sweet Asriel were still there, and they looked so happy as they cheered for us in the front row, the roar of the crowd filling our ears as my heartbeat thumped louder still...ohhh." She clasped her own body tightly, smiling warmly and murring. "It was such a magical night."

"Do monsters often sing and dance?" Elliot asked as he placed his hands on his hips, looking intrigued as Toriel smiled happily and rose up, giving a deep bow.

"Why, of course! Its how we access our magic! How we express ourselves! It's as much a part of our identity as our Souls themselves!" She proclaimed as Elliot took her clawed paw, and the two began to circle around as even more soft music seemed to fill the air, Neil giving a little smile.

"Have you danced with other humans like myself?" He asked, an idea coming to him. If he played his cards right, he wouldn't need to RESET at all. Toriel nodded as she bent him back, the two engaging in a delightful waltz as more memories crept into Toriel's voice.

"Oh, without a doubt. Little Hope and Qiang and Christa were excellent learners. Poor Anthony was rather clumsy, but he was so happy to learn."

Four. Just four humans had fallen down. Neil grinned inwardly. If he could just keep Frisk and Bonnie from getting out through the Ruins, he'd be fine. After all, Toriel visited the opening cave that humans could fall on through every day, and he could watch the exit from the Ruins by staying with Toriel. He could make sure nobody else had to die.

"Toriel...I'd love to stay here with you." He offered to her as he spun her around over the carpeting, and clapped his hands together. "But come! For now, there only exists you...me...and the WALTZ!" Neil Elliot laughed aloud as the monsters outside Toriel's home watched in amusement, a little Whismun blowing her nose into a tissue.

"Oh, it's just so beautiful!" She sobbed. "I just love happy endings."

"I don't know." Loox Eyewalker murmured as his family members muttered amongst each other, the little Mike-the-Monster-Esque lookalike tilting his head to the side. "I'm getting a sense of deja vu every time I look at this kid. There's just something about him I don't really like."

Unbeknownst to them, miles away, another patron was making the same comment at the exact same time. Grillby's bar was popping that night, whenever Tuesday Karaoke came around the place was lit up brighter than a Christmas tree. People were having to pile outside to dance and sing along to the music that wafted through the cold night air, hands clapping together and smiles even brighter than Grillby's own fiery body. The bartender and owner of the bar looked as though he was a living human made of fire, dressed in a dapper white suit with an even MORE dapper black vest, a pair of glasses somehow over a nonexistent "nose" on his fiery face. An adorable little black bow tie and a tilted head, he gazed at the complaining, armor-clad Dog Guard who was looking over at Sans the Skeleton as his family sat in a booth together, all smiling warmly as the next singer took the stage. The lights within the bar focused in on the immense wooden stage, circular tables filling the dining area as others sat right at the bar, the offending customer "harrumphing".

"I'm serious, Grillby. There's something about Sans I don't really like. He's able to move without...moving. Those shortcuts of his, his lazy attitude and..."

The dog guard trailed off as Grillby tilted his head to the other side.

"...sometimes I...sometimes I can SWEAR he's looking right at us guards. Remember when he alerted us about those humans that came through, and we went to claim their Souls?" Dogbert remarked. "He was staring right through me. Judging me. I'm sure of it."

"Sans has a soft spot for kids, maybe." Grillby remarked in his golden voice.

"If he DID, he wouldn't have alerted us to where they were." Dogbert mumbled. "No, it's something else. I just don't get it."

Meanwhile, Sans and his brothers were sitting at their table, Papyrus pushing the red scarf he wore to the side with his gigantic red-gloved hands. He was wearing big, showy armor of white over his chest with red boots to match the gloves, and a big, cheery smile as his voice bordered on the edge of annoying, yet endearing. The best way to sum up Papyrus was that he was like a cute little puppy who always followed you around; annoying, yet adorable. His long, thin head tilted to the side as he heard the horse/mermaid mix that was Aaron of Waterfall proclaim the loss of his "one true love".

**_"Oh I never thought it'd end like this! Just because I got no tits! I'll shave my legs, I'll wear a bra! I'll even cut my penis off for you!"_ **

The head of the Royal Guard sniggered, covering her mouth as she shook her head back and forth, red ponytailed hair flopping about as her gleaming golden/yellow looked back at Aaron. "Oh, ain't that sweet." She said in her rather loud, faintly British, almost punky voice.

"BUT AARON HAS NO LEGS..." Papyrus mumbled.

"Aaron doesn't have a lot of things. Including tact. Or ANY chance of dating Ms. Undyne, to be honest." Their eldest brother intoned as the black-jacketed skeleton cheekily smiled. Lines ran across his face, one line going up from his right eye socket, the other going down from his left one as he steepled his bony fingers, gigantic holes within his hands as he chuckled at the sight of Aaron. "So what song will you be singing tonight?" He inquired of Sans as Sans gave a little tilt of his head and a wink.

**"tequila."**

"...of course it'd be that." W.D Gaster intoned as the skeleton shook his head back and forth. "You WOULD pick the one that requires the least amount of effort. I hope we can go up soon, I need to head back to the lab." He remarked, a faintly nervous tone briefly flickering into his voice as Sans saw the expression briefly change on his brother's face.

**"wing dings, you can't keep nothin' from me. what're you thinkin' about?"**

"Sometimes, I...I think I can see them." Gaster confessed softly as his tone became conspiratorial, clasping his hole-filled hands together as his head sunk a bit. "Staring at me in the dark, accusingly gazing, sad and somber." He cringed. _"I haven't slept in nine days."_

Papyrus rubbed his chin. "PERHAPS YOU SHOULD RETURN HOME AND BRING THE SOULS WITH YOU! BEING IN PAPYRUS'S ROOM WOULD CHEER UP ANY LONELY SOUL!" He added with a cheery smile. "I'VE ADDED MORE POSTERS."

Gaster gave his brother a sad little smile. "You've always known how to brighten up my day." He admitted. "Maybe some time away from the lab WILL be good." He added quietly, unaware he was being listened to, a figure in the booth next to him tilting her cowboy hat down before she took a draw of the cigarette she had in her mouth, her brown hair falling down around her face. Convincing horns were poking up on her forehead, fake fangs in her mouth as her green eyes turned around and gazed intently at the skeletons behind her before exiting the bar, and making for the cold lands of Snowdin.

The town was picturesque and beautiful, as soft snowflakes gently wafted down around her, and she ambled by various people eager to try and claim the spot she'd been sitting at. She made her way towards the eastern section of the town as the snow slowly drifted around her, the river to her left as she kept her hands in the pockets of her tan jacket. The houses were like something from out of a Christmas storybook, all tiny and small, round and picturesque with cute little red roofs and gentle candles in the windows as she sighed, approaching the exit to the town before seeing a kid was approaching, small, yellow and brown, faintly lizardlike with a spiked head as he cheerily smiled at her.

"Hey there! You're new, right? I'm here to see Undyne! Is she still singing in Mr. Grillby's bar?" The young dibbun asked, shaking slightly from the cold as concern flashed over the brown-haired girl staring down at him.

"You're here all by yourself?" The teenager asked, her voice becoming...concerned. "Ain't safe for a little kid to be out here all alone." She quietly mumbled.

"Well, my parents kinda work in the CORE, and they don't get home until late, so I'm used to being alone." The little Monster Kid confessed with a shrug of his nonexistent shoulders, for he had no arms, only two little legs and a spiky tail. The teenage girl hesitated again. "So is Undyne still singing?" He asked before sneezing. "HACHOOO!"

"She's just a-finishing up a duet with that there mer-horse. Aaron, I think his name is." She sighed. "I'll take ya there. Wouldn't feel kid just leavin' ya out here alone. Aren'tcha cold?"

"A b-bit." He admitted. "I just kinda ran all the way here from Waterfall, d-didn't have time to put a scarf on."

"...here." The girl said with a little smile, taking off her tan jacket and draping it over him as she lifted him up onto her shoulder, and turned around. Going to the lab could wait a little while, she thought to herself. "I'll let you watch Undyne perform, then I can walk you home. How about that?" She asked.

"That's so nice of you!" The Monster Kid said with a large smile, looking up at her as she walked along the snowy path, heading back towards the warmth of Grillby's bar. "What's your name?"

"Bonnie." Bonnie the Human said. "I'm new in town." She added, watching as Dr. Gaster, Royal Scientist, made his way past her towards the exit of the town, and quietly promised herself...soon. Soon she'd avenge the others who'd come through. All those poor kids the monsters had MURDERED.

Let Justice be done. She'd been too late before.

...far too late. But not this time. This time, it would be different...

She stewed, and she thought, and she simmered, unaware that, bit by bit, more and more people were coming on up to the stage to sing. And then, suddenly, Monster Kid had asked-

"Hey, why don't you sing? You're new to town, right?" He'd asked, others in the bar now seeming to really notice Bonnie as she looked up at them, blinking a bit. Her little disguise seemed to be working, they didn't recognize her as a human, but being given the label "new", she was now standing out like a sore thumb. "Come on. Grillby can fit one more song in for tonight."

"I always love hearing new voices." Grillby said with a calm nod of his head as the others in his diner and bar all nodded at once, Bonnie biting her lip before a song began to rise in her mind. Perhaps it was spiteful. Perhaps it was cruel. But she wanted to sing it.

"Alright. Reckon I can sing a bit." The country girl confessed, making her way to the stage as Monster Kid sat next to the scale-bodied fish warrior that was Undyne, Head of the Royal Guard. She smirked, folding her well-developed arms over her chest, tilting her head a bit to watch what this newcomer had to sing.

"Gonna do a little country?" She inquired with a chuckle. "You know, I heard that if you play country music backwards, you get your wife back, your house back and your dog back!" The Head of the Royal Guard remarked as the others in the bar chuckled all at once.

Their chuckling didn't last long as Bonnie clasped her hands together, and closed her eyes, bowing her head as if in prayer, her voice clear, piercing, and powerful.

**_Lullay, lullay, my little tiny child,  
Bye-bye, lullay, lullay!_ **

Everyone in Grillby's bar went quiet as a mouse. Her words carried through the air, as only the youngest and most innocent patrons seemed oblivious to what was being implied, as Sans's eyes turned into black sockets, Grillby slowly turned to look away, Undyne's smile becoming a taut line as Gaster buried his face in one hand.

**_Oh, sisters two, How may we do, for to preserve this day?  
This poor youngling, of whom we do sing, bye-bye, lullay, lullay!_ **

**_Lullay, lullay, my little tiny child,  
Bye-bye, lullay, lullay!_ **

It was an ancient, old song. The Kingdom knew its meaning all too well, for in the days of old, much of them had indeed been Christian. After all, most of them had called Europe their home, and the soft church music every Sunday that drifted over their villages had, at one point, been a comfort to them. Even the agnostic Sans had always said that Christians had the prettiest music he'd ever heard from a religion.

But one song had always made them flinch whenever they heard even a tiny bit of it, foolishly played by a young little dibbun that had popped on a "Greatest Christmas Songs" CD or tape. A song with a meaning they knew far...too...well.

 **_Herod the King, in hiiiiis ragiiiiiing...charged he hath this daaaaay!  
_ ** **_His meeeeen of miiiiight...in hiiiiis own siiiight...all children young to slay!_ **

**_Lullay, lullay, my little tiny child,  
Bye-bye, lullay, lullay!_ **

Bonnie could see the child's tear-filled eyes every time she closed her own. He'd just hung his head and covered his face as she stayed hidden in Hotland, hiding behind a natural pillar as the guards had advanced. The skeleton had been off in the distance, and had turned away as the guards raised their weapons, holding the jar in which he'd collect the youngling's soul under his arm. The guards hadn't...done a good job. Their first time hadn't...killed the redheaded little chef. They'd been too disturbed at killing something that hadn't even fought back once. Especially someone who had looked so much like the former princess Chara...

Every day Bonnie could see Anthony's body, his kind, sweet little face ashen and small in death. Every...damn...day.

Gaster wasn't the only one haunted in the night.  
****__  
Oh woe is me, poor child for thee! And ever morn and day...  
_For thy parting...neither say nor sing...bye-bye, lullay, lullay!_

**_Lullay, lullay, my little tiny child,  
Bye-bye, lullay...luuuullaaaaay!_ **


	3. All the Underground's A Stage

Frisk let out a groan, the Asian-American-blooded young lad moaning as he rubbed his head, cringing, shaking it back and forth as his brown hair flopped about. He slowly opened up his grassy-green eyes, gazing out at the dark entrance he'd fallen into. It had been frankly an amazing feat to survive falling down here to begin with, but...he'd been desperate. Desperate to find his mother, and hearing she'd died on the mountain, Frisk had been in denial. He so, SO badly wanted to find here, he would have done anything.

So he'd tripped on a root and fallen into the open cave, down, down into the dark abyss below, landing in a field of oddly comfy, plush flowers...and was now staring up at a big, yellow-petaled flower with a white face that was smiling at him.

"Howdy! I'm Flowey! Flowey the Flower!" It announced in a chipper tone before it heard a sharp whistle.

"Heyyyyyy! You better not be being rude to our new guest, FLOWEY." A faintly Midwestern voice rang out through the darkness as Frisk turned, seeing a blonde-haired young child in a pink tutu who had lovely blue eyes approaching. Flowey "harrumphed", folding petals over his "chest" in a disgrunted expression before the tutu-wearing kid helped Frisk up. "I recognize you, you're Frisk!"

"And you're one of the missing kids." Frisk remarked, looking Neil Elliot over. "I've seen your face on the flyers in my neighborhood." He added with a nod, shaking Neil's hand. "Is...that flower really talking?"

"Oh, this flower does more than TALK!" Flowey growled out, stretching his little petal limbs wide as white bullets soared through the air. Frisk ducked away, but gasped in amazement as Neil expertly wove in and out of the bullets, smoothly twisting and twirling, humming cheerily to himself as Flowey growled and, had he been able, would have stomped on the ground beneath him.

"You big, fat, cheater!" He snapped. "You big fat dirty cheat!" The talking flower protested, shaking his little head back and forth before popping into the ground with a THWOOOP as Neil gave a deep bow to Frisk, his tutu flapping slightly.

"Woooowwww..." Frisk murmured, hands going to his mouth as he looked at Neil, amazed at the fluidity and majesty with which the blonde-haired boy had moved. "How did you dodge all that? It was like you knew exactly what was gonna happen!"

"I kind of do." Neil said with a smile. "I have an ability, it sort of helps me know what's gonna happen. But I can help you out if you'd like." He offered, giving Frisk a cheery little smile. "Come on and follow me, there's a really nice lady who's been taking care of me down here, she can help explain how things REALLY work."

Frisk looked a bit nervous, but then smiled and followed after Neil down the long purple hallways, past cheery, waving frog creatures, little fairy-esque monsters, and the occasional cyclops and jelly blob that looked in his direction. Many of them were quite interested to see a new human arrive, but none of the monsters of the Ruins were as happy as Toriel, who was overjoyed to see another human.

"Hello, my child! I'm Toriel, Guardian and Caretaker of the Ruins." She had explained, shaking Frisk's little hand, her fur soft and warm the touch as she led him inside her home, and into the main living room where a chalk board had been set up, not too far from the table. The room's chairs were turned to face the chalk board, and Toriel held up a thick bit of chalk that had odd letters and symbols etched into it. "Neil has been my student down here for a good three months, and he's been so eager to learn!"

"About what?" Frisk inquired as Neil gave him a little nudge in the elbow.

"Watch this." He whispered, turning to Toriel. "Um, Mom?" He asked, Toriel smiling warmly back at him at the mere mention of the word "mom" as he clasped his hands in front of him and held them down. "Could you, uh...do THAT lesson? The one about the universe's beginning?"

"Ohh, of course! Dr. Gaster developed it with me, it was our favorite to impart to my own son and my adopted daughter back in the day." Toriel said with a wistful sigh. "A bit of magic chalk and just the right attitude is all you need." She intoned with a little laugh, sounding almost like Mary Poppins as she twirled about in her robe, then drew a small, tiny little ball on the center of the chalkboard that glimmered softly, twinkling...like a star. Frisk's eyes widened, and his mouth fell open as Toriel began...to sing.

 _**Our whole universe was in a hot, dense state!** _  
_**Then nearly fourteen billion years ago expansion started-** _

"Wait!" Neil added, he and Frisk taking their seats as Toriel grinned, and then began to sketch even MORE furiously, and with every sweep and swipe of the chalk, the scene began to change upon the chalkboard through literal magic, Frisk's eyes going even wider.

 _**The Earth began to cool, the autodrophs began to drool,** _  
_**neanderthals developed tools, we built a wall!** _

"We built the pyramids!" Neil sang along.

Math, science, history, unraveling the mysteries that all started with the big bang!

Now Toriel began to draw PEOPLE on the board, the monkeys turning to apes, then humans and monsters, the two splitting off, twirling off the board and dissolving into twinkling stars as Frisk clapped his hands together in delight, laughing eagerly.

 _**Since the dawn of man" is really not that long,** _  
_**As every galaxy was formed in less time than it takes to sing this song!** _  
_**A fraction of a second and the elements were made!** _

_**The bipeds stood up straight, The dinosaurs all met their fate,** _  
_**They tried to leap but they were late, And they all died!** _

"They froze their asses off!" Neil sniggered as Toriel now drew a large supercontinent that began to shift and morph and stretch, finally splitting out into the continents that Frisk could recognize, Toriel giving the young human a wink.

 _**The oceans and Pangaea, see ya wouldn't wanna be ya** _  
_**Set in motion by the same big bang!** _  
_**It all started with the big bang!** _

And NOW, Toriel drew a galaxy upon the board, the galaxy beginning to draw in on itself, more and more, becoming that same, small dot from before...

 _**It's expanding ever outward but one day** _  
_**It will pause and start to go the other way.** _  
_**Collapsing ever inward, we won't be here, it won't be heard** _  
_**Our best and brightest figure that it'll make an even bigger bang!** _

And then EXPLODING outward into an even bigger galaxy, twinkling stars shooting out all through the room as Frisk let out a "wowwwww" in amazement over what he was seeing.

Neil gave a shrug, and now HE began to sing. "Australopithecus would really have been sick of us, debating how we're here, they're catching deer!"

And now Frisk understood. Now he 'got' it, and gave a little wink. "We're catching viruses!" He laughed.

"Religion or astronomy!" Toriel proclaimed.

"Descartes or Deuteronomy?" Frisk inquired.

"It all started with the big bang!" Neil and Toriel sang out at once, one hand clasped in the other, their other arms stretched.

"Music and mythology, Einstein and astrology?" Frisk asked.

"It all started with the big bang!"

And then, all together, as one...

_**It all started with the big...BANG!** _

Frisk laughed in delight, and began clapping his hands, smiling warmly, nodding his head up and down. "I love it, I love it!" He proclaimed. "So you do ALL your lessons like this?"

"We do everything like this!" Neil said. "Music is how a monster expresses itself! It's the language of the Soul! The very culimation of their being!" He then gave a bow. "And I'll teach you everything you'd like to know about it." He offered.

Frisk said yes in a second. And so, the next month was spent in an almost heavenly state. Without a doubt, they were some of the happiest days of all three's lives, as Neil helped Frisk learn to ballet dance, and more importantly...how to dodge. Frisk became nimble and swift, expertly leaping through the air, pirouetting about, twirling and prancing, working in tandem with Neil as a perfect partner. They would eat long meals with Toriel, talking and singing into the night by her fireplace before being tucked into bed, awoken by the smell of delightful cinnamon-butterscotch pie.

More importantly, Frisk had gained a sense of how the Underground truly worked. He could feel the rhythm of the land running through his blood, almost see when he looked around the song on everyone's lips. It was as if all the Underground was an eternal concert, and if you knew what notes to play, everyone had no choice but to be in awe of you. Yet even then, he didn't quite have Neil's skill.

When it came to Neil, there was nobody else greater at dancing. Though he had a decent voice that could be operatic and carry far, what he did best of all was immerse those who watched him in his movements, so dynamic and powerful, so fluid and smooth, it was as if the wind itself had reincarnated as a child, and Toriel always smiled in delight whenever she watched him perform out by the tree in her yard.

She sighed softly, leaning against the door frame, watching as Neil and Frisk headed out into the Ruins, to do a performance for the moldsmals. The jello-like creatures were rather stupid, but they knew what to do with that big, fat, butt!

_**WIGGLE-WIGGLE-WIGGLE.** _

Toriel sniggered, thinking back to the first time she'd seen them do that. They'd not been the only ones to realize how much moldsmals liked that Jason DeRulo song, no, Chara-

...Chara. Toriel sighed softly, watching her children enter the next hallway, and for a brief moment, it wasn't Frisk and Neil she was seeing, but little Asriel and Chara all over again.

Meanwhile, Bonnie Hatfield-McCoy was lying in wait. She'd snuck her way into the laboratory of Dr. Gaster and had been watching him intently, getting a lay of the place. It had helped that his assistant, Ms. Alphys, had been taking more time on her robot creation than the security system which didn't have cameras set up yet. Or rather, not ENOUGH. There were such huge, obvious blind spots that it was easy for Bonnie to sneak around as long as she did a bit of shimmying in just the right vent shafts.

And now she found herself deep within the laboratory, Dr. Gaster looking over a computer screen, analyzing the findings...and his eyes were wide with horror, eye sockets bulging, bony hands gripping the table of the computer as Sans and the dinosaur-esque Alphys stood nearby. Ms. Alphys adjusted her glasses, looking nervously at Dr. Gaster as her faintly bucktoothed expression softly broke. "...Wing?" She asked.

"...dark, darker, yet darker, the darkness keeps growing, the shadows cutting deeper, photon readings NEGATIVE." Wing Ding Gaster murmured. "This next experiment seems very...VERY...interesting..."

He paused for what seemed to be a long time, laughing wryly before slowly turning around. "...what do you two think?" He inquired, showing them the screen as they examined it, mouths agape, Sans's eye sockets turning pure black.

"...interesting's one way ta put it, doc." He mumbled. "...i was gonna call it "positively horrifying"."

"This is awful!" Alphys exclaimed. "This means the end of time and space! Everything collapsing! How are we supposed to stop it?!""

"All of this is dependent on this "anomaly" I've found in the...well, I suppose the only way I can describe it as "code"...that makes up our reality." Gaster cofnessed. "If we destroy it...we can avert this disaster." He concluded with a nod. "It's the only thing I can think of, and the good news is that the anomaly is currently present within the Underground. The radius scan indicates it isn't more than 10 miles away from this very location. Thank heaven's for small mercies."

"Any idea what it could be?" Alphys inquired.

"I am acting on a hunch, and comparing it to the data we've acquired from the Souls we captured." Gaster said, his hands flying over the keyboard, Bonnie cringing and gritting her teeth, seeing data spilling out over the computer screen. "Yes. Yes, just as I thought. The anomaly has an amazing amount of Determination. More so than any monster ever could. It must be a human. Perhaps even another human child." The skeletal doctor mused. "...Alphys?"

Alphys shot up towards Gaster, looking away from the screen. "Yes?"

"...your...new project, the robot? Mettaton, you called it?"

"Yes?"

"I think it might be best to implement as many human-fighting features as you can. I can do work on the security system with Sans as we get cameras set up through the Underground to search for our little anomaly. Then, perhaps, we can send your robot to track them down? No need to endanger any monsters if we can help it."

"Oh, wonderful idea!" Alphys said, nodding eagerly. "I'll finish the body straight away! I woulda completed it sooner, but I've not yet finished the lower part. Every time I try to, I get all SWEATY for some reason." She sheepishly confessed, making her way out of the laboratory, Dr. Gaster and Sans chuckling as they exited the other way, Bonnie waiting until they were long gone before finally sliding out the vent, looking over the screen. Looking at the Soul data, at...photos taken of the dead children.

And she thought of her own child, taking out her own photograph from her wallet in her back pocket, as her hands brushed over it just at the same time Toriel's own hands brushed over a dusty photograph of a smiling little goat, a girl with brownish/red eyes and she and her husband, all holding flowers.

Seemed like only yesterday her family had been together.

"Schoolbag in hand, she leaves home in the early morning!  
Waving goodbye...with an absentminded smiiiile!  
I watch her go with a surge of that well-known sadness,  
And I have to sit down for a whiiile!"

Toriel sighed softly, picturing Chara's brown hair flopping about, her bookbag bouncing against her back as she ran down the street with Asriel's hand in hers. She could picture her turning, smiling warmly back at her beloved mother and father, her cheeks so red and rosy, returning to the school for the third week, things going so well, the Underground full of hope.

 _**The feeling that I'm losing her foreveeer!** _  
_**And without really entering her woooorld!** _  
_**I'm glad whenever I can share the laughter,** _  
_**that funny little giiiirl!** _

She remembered tucking Chara in, kissing her forehead before she went to bed. She could feel her embrace once again, and the way Chara had always smelled like chocolate. Toriel could see Asriel and Chara lying in the flowers, Chara describing how she'd find shapes in the clouds, Asriel almost seeing them himself as he closed his mind and Chara let her imagination run wild. The goatly mother sighed softly, shaking her head back and forth as she held the photograph in her hand.

 _**Slipping through my fingers all the time,** _  
_**I try capture every minute!** _  
_**The feeling in it,** _  
_**slipping through my fingers all the time!** _  
_**Do I really see what's in her mind?** _  
_**Each time I think I'm close to knowiiing,** _  
_**She keeps on growing,** _  
_**slipping through my fingers all the tiiime!** _

Bonnie shook her head back and forth as she held the photograph in her hand, seeing Frisk's tiny face as she put the bottle to his lips. She could feel how soft and warm he was, like a living pillow in her arms as he sucked on the bottle and she smiled down upon him. It had hurt to have a father who had committed suicide rather than own up to fatherly duties, but Bonnie wasn't going to let that stop her from being the best damn mother she could be. Yet those close morning breakfasts had become less and less close as Frisk had to go off to school, and she had to go off to her job as security at the guard station of Mount Ebott, a lingering sadness ringing in her heart.

 _**Sleep in our eyes, him and me at the breakfast table!** _  
_**Barely awake...I let precious time go byyyy!** _  
_**Then when he's gone, there's that odd, melancholy feeling,** _  
_**and the sense of guilt I can't deny!** _

She had wanted to do so much with Frisk when he was older. Sure, she'd shown him how to fish. How to ride a horse. How to play the harmonica, oh he LOOOVED her harmonica, and her notes would drift up through the night sky when they sat on the porch outside their home. Yet...these were all such brief, tiny snippets. So...lacking. Not nearly enough.

 _**What happened to those wonderful adventuuures?** _  
_**The places I had planned for us to go?** _  
_**Well, some of that we did, but most we didn't!** _  
_**And why, I just don't know?** _

_**Slipping through my fingers all the time,** _  
_**I try capture every minute!** _  
_**The feeling in it,** _  
_**slipping through my fingers all the time!** _  
_**Do I really see what's in his mind?** _  
_**Each time I think I'm close to knowiiing,** _  
_**He keeps on growing,** _  
_**slipping through my fingers all the tiiime!** _

As the two mothers held the photos tightly to their chest, their voices softly drifted through the air...

"Some times I wish that I could freeze the pictuuuure!  
And save it from the funny tricks of time!  
Slipping through my fingeeeeers!"

Toriel covered her face, shaking her head back and forth as quiet laughter rang out from her voice, and she made her way down her house's steps, into the deep purple halls of the basement, heading towards a doorway in the distance.  "Ha-ha-ha...I...I don't want to let go." She whispered, finally releasing him before she slowly made her way towards the downward stairs, and the exit of the ruins, resting her hand against it.

"... _I don't want to let go_..." She realized, before a knock she was all-too-familiar with came from the other end.

**"heya! knock knock!"**

"...who is there?" Toriel mumbled out.

**"a broken pencil."**

"...a broken pencil...who?"

**"nevermind, it's pointless."**

"H-heh..." Toriel quietly laughed. "...sorry, I'm...it's just..."

 **"hey, you can tell me anything, lady."** The voice from the other end spoke up, it's voice deep but warm. **"c'mon. What's wrong?"**

"...if a human ever comes through this door...could you please, please promise me something?" Toriel sobbed out, resting herself against the exit to the ruins, her body shaking, the tears falling openly. "Watch over them and protect them...will you not?"

For a few minutes, there was nothing but silence. But then...

A gentle knock back.

**"lady, someone like you who sincerely likes bad jokes?...you got an integrity a guy can't say "no" to."**

And with that, Sans popped back into the lab, chuckling as he made his way back to his room...suddenly seeing a teenage human in the main computer room just down the hall. She was clutching a photograph tightly, covering her face with one hand and trying to suppress sobs as she slowly put the photograph back in her jacket pocket, and made towards a nearby vent, climbing up onto a cupboard. Sans quivered a bit, unsure of what to do...

...but he'd just made a promise. He sighed. He wouldn't tell the others about this. For all the good it would do. He'd just finished putting the cameras up around the laboratory exterior...

And sure enough, Dr. Gaster would be the first one to realize that the "new monster" that had been hanging around town had seemed familiar for a reason. Now that she had that makeup and those fake horns off, he could recognize what he was REALLY looking at. 

"The anomaly?" He wondered quietly, aloud to himself as he sat back in his chair and looked at the camera screen, arms folded across his bony chest. "...well. One way to find out." He remarked darkly, and snapped his fingers, vanishing in a flash of light.

Sans wasn't the only one good at "shortcuts". After all, who did you think taught his little brother all he knew? 


	4. Rising Climax

He remembered the first time he saw her. The very first time.

 

She’d had such a cute little smile, that brown-haired, brown-eyed girl. Little green and yellow longsleeve shirt. Rosy cheeks and that...that inquisitive tilt to her head, as if everything in the world was new and she wanted to question it.

 

“I'm Chara." The girl had said. "You'd like to exit the ruins, wouldn't you? I can show you how."

 

And her method of how...involved KNIVES. 

 

Chara’s solution was to hurt those that hurt her. She was a sad, angry girl who had lashed out at a world that didn’t seem to care about her. Her family had neglected her, and the stories were pretty prevalent around Simsbury. She would talk about sticking pins into her parents when they slept, so they “can’t see me do it”. They’d sometimes hear her screeching “I WANNA KILL YOU! I WANNA KILL YOU, MOMMY!” before Chara would come racing out of her home, and barreling down the sidewalk. She would go out into the woods and bang gigantic sticks against the trees…

 

Everyone knew the stories about Chara Vardalos. Neil hadn’t been too surprised to find out just how true they’d all been, and how...terrifying she was, even in death.

 

But at night, he’d see her. Sitting in a dark abyss, and slowly turning to look at him. Her smile would stretch wide and he’d shudder as he took a step back. 

 

Gaster would see the children smiling at him, and he would fall to his knees and cover his face, guilt and agony digging into him. Asgore would see their souls softly gazing at him, and see the faces of his beloved children and his dear wife, accusingly gazing out from darkness. Grillby, Former King of the Monsters, would always see a single little human child. An infant who’s face haunted him every night. 

 

Neil...was haunted every night by a single, solitary face. A face with a smile too disturbingly wide, horrific, oil-like OOZE glopping out of her jaws. 

 

_ “Hello partner.”  _

 

He awoke clutching his eyes, shuddering in an icy, cold chill.

 

...they all did. ALL of them. Every...single...night.

 

…

 

…

 

…

 

...Bonnie wasn't sure exactly when she picked up on the fact she was being tracked. But she felt it. She felt it digging into the back of her neck, the horrific, awful sensation, that gut instinct that told her that she was being followed...hunted. Bonnie inwardly flinched at this revelation as it bathed over her, walking along a long, steely platform, her every step making hollow ringing noises that echoed through the air in Waterfall as near-absolute darkness engulfed the surroundings. This was a gut instinct that paid to be listened to, a gut instinct she'd picked up from years of experience. 

 

It was what allowed her to dive out of the way in time to avoid a dual blast of potent, light blue energy that sparked like lightning and almost electrocuted her. She rolled out of the way, panting a bit, her hat almost flying off her head as she gripped the platform beneath her. Her grey eyes gazed intensely at the skeletal being that rose up in the air, holey hands held up as he glowed with soft blue light. "Hello, human." Wing Ding Aster, aka Gaster, remarked as he landed down upon the metal platforms with Bonnie. 

 

"...you've got a high level of "LV" on you." She remarked quietly, Gaster's white eyes slightly narrowing in their black, empty sockets as he folded his arms over his labcoated chest. 

 

"How can you tell?" He inquired softly, sounding almost intrigued. "I admit, my scientific curiosity is piqued. Normally only a monster can tell how high someone's "LV" is." 

 

"You really think MONSTERS are the only ones who discovered Levels of Violence?" Bonnie quietly intoned. "I've been alive since the 1800's. We picked up on it quick out west where every day could be a struggle for survival." 

 

Now Gaster grinned. "Ahhh. So THAT'S your ability. Every single human that fell down here has had fascinating magical traits. I believe Mt. Ebott calls out to them, resonating with something in their souls to bring them here. My time travel experiments failed. My attempt to create barrier-breaking weapons failed. But now I'm beginning to think perhaps...the answer lies somewhere else. It's as if God himself wants us to break out. He has provided the ram for the sacrifice."

 

"I think you took the "suffer little Children" part the wrong way." Bonnie hissed back, Gaster shaking his head.

 

"Now, now. I consider myself a good Christian, human. Which is why I'm not going to murder you. No, it'll be a fair fight. I'll only use ONE of my magical attributes to put an end to your life." 

 

He held up a holey hand, clenching it tightly into a fist as that same green magic sparked around it, twisting and turning and forming an immense fireball. "Green...the color of Kindness. It's magic is merciful, and grants its enemies an end without pain."

 

Bonnie whipped out the pistol from her hidden holster, Gaster barely dodging in time as a shot that would have blown his hand off richoethed off the wall. "Move along, lil' doggie. Or this big dog will move you along!" 

 

Gaster held up a hand, a burst of green energy shooting forth as Bonnie rolled out of the way, and he focused intensely as powerful guitar music began to echo in the air. He swerved and swayed, gigantic hands  forming behind him, green energy coalescing around in them before he shot them forth at Bonnie, the hands trying to blast her anew. "Science has failed me again and again. But perhaps a far greater power is now making all the stars align!" 

 

Bonnie barely rolled out of the way in time, firing off another shot at Gaster as one of the gigantic hands calmly blocked the shot, the brown-haired teenage girl cringing as she heard the song echoing through the dark caverns of Waterfall. 

 

**_Making two possibilities a reality,_ **

**_Predicting the future of things we all know,_ **

**_Fighting off the diseased programming..._ **

**_Of centuries, centuries, centuries, centuries!_ **

 

Bonnie rolled out of the way again, another palm blast from one of Gaster's gigantic floating hands almost slamming into her. She took off running, trying to circle around him, only for one of the hands to sweep at her. She halted herself just in time to avoid getting struck, then fired at him anew, the other hand once again blocking her shot as she pulled out another pistol. 

 

**_Science fails to recognize the single most_ **

**_Potent element of all existence!_ **

**_Letting the reigns go..._ **

**_to the unfolding is_ **

**_Faith, faith, faith, faith!_ **

 

Bonnie then leapt up as another gigantic hand swiped at her, Gaster reeling back as she fired over his other immense hand. He chuckled a bit, spreading his arms wide as one of the hands managed to catch Bonnie, slamming her into the platform as another hovered overhead. Green energy began to sweep around it, aiming to engulf her when she managed to get off a shot, which struck Gaster hard in his leg. He let out a gasp, and the hands quivered and shook, allowing her to roll away just in time as he panted and heaved, gripping his wounded leg, milky dust seeping out of his hands. 

 

**_Science! Has failed! Our world!_ **

**_Sciiiience! Has failed our Mother Eaaaaaaarth!_ **

 

He held up his hands high and twisted his arms, and the gigantic hands all shot forth, trying to slam into Bonnie at once. She leapt UP, high over the hands, and firing at Gaster as he reeled back, seemingly falling off the platform. Bonnie grinned as the hands vanished...then realized there was ANOTHER platform below it.

 

And she could see the green energy surging from below, trying to shoot her from beneath!

 

**_Science fails to recognize the single most_ **

**_Potent element of all existence!_ **

**_Letting the reigns go..._ **

**_to the unfolding is_ **

**_Faith, faith, faith, faith!_ **

 

Bonnie bolted off, heading back towards Snowdin, panting heavily as sweat dripped down her brow, green energy barely missing her as she tore off through the dark halls of Waterfall, that same haunting music echoing through the dark.

 

**_Science! Has failed! Our world!_ **

**_Sciiiience! Has failed our Mother Eaaaaaaarth!_ **

 

But now even MORE beams were shooting up, and she realized Gaster was putting in even more effort. She managed to leap off, finding herself back at the stony passageways with the ancient history plaques lining the walls...and she could see FOUR immense hands now hovering behind her, all forming energy that sparked with potent green light. 

 

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things!_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things!_ **

 

She acted quickly, and slid off the side, barely gripping the edge in time as four beams coalesced with each other, and she could faintly feel it pass by her fingers, panting and heaving as she heaved herself up, then continued racing down the stony halls. But she knew she couldn't keep it up forever. Luckily, the drop down to a lower level was up ahead, and she dove ahead, slamming into the ground as another powerful green beam just barely missed her. She coughed and spluttered, staggering up, rising to her feet as she took off running across the dark plains, the king's castle far off in the distance, "stars" a-glitter in the sky as she heard Gaster's voice once again...

 

**_Letting the reigns go..._ **

**_to the unfolding is_ **

**_Faith, faith, faith, faith!_ **

 

There he was, high above her, being held up on ANOTHER gigantic, faintly etheral hand that softly glowed with green energy as she saw the four other hands all forming a circle around her, spinning around and around as green magical power began coalescing around the holey palms. 

 

**_Science! Has failed! Our world!_ **

**_Sciiiience! Has failed our Mother Eaaaaaaarth!_ **

 

She fired away at Gaster above, trying to get the hands to shake and wobble like they had before, but he ducked down slightly on the gigantic hand he stood upon as IT took the shots instead of him, and she gasped as she heard the whine of the beams revving up.

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things!_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things!_ **

 

She tried to dodge as best she could, but the beams of energy caught her on one of her sides, spinning her around, a sensation like being socked in the gut by a punch of pure wind sinking into her before another beam struck her back...

 

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things,_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things_ **

**_Spirit-moves-through-all-things,_ **

**_Science has failed our Mother Eaaaarth!_ **

 

And she collapsed onto the rocky floor and remembered...nothing more. 

 

...

 

...

 

...

 

...Sans was back at that door. That special door he'd tell knock-knock jokes to. But this time, when he knocked...a different voice answered.

 

"Hello, Sans." A tired voice remarked.  

 

Sans's skeletal face slightly stiffened as his eye sockets got dark. The voice was distinctly human, and young, and he had a feeling he knew exactly who was talking to him. A sense of deja vu struck deep into his bony spine as he quietly spoke. "...who am I talking to?"

 

"I think a better question's "what", Mr. Sans." The voice remarked back as Sans leaned back, slowly sliding down the large purple door, and flopping his fat, skeletal frame into the snowy path below. A loud yawn. “S-Sorry, I...I ain’t sleeping so well.” 

 

"...human, huh?"

 

"Yep. Don't worry, the nice lady you've been tellin' jokes to is being really nice to me and-" A cringe. "CRAP. You weren't supposed to hear that. One minute, I'll fix this, I..." The young boy's voice hesitated. "...no, I can't RESET for stuff as small as that. I made a promise to never do it again." 

 

Sans's eyes were as dark and soulless as a night without stars in the sky. "you can...RESET?" He whispered, his voice cold and accusing. "y’know, my bro did research on that. I thought he was the only one who had experience in time/space. tell me, kid. how many times have you RESET?"

 

"I'm not sure. I mostly did it for small stuff, at first, just...getting out of being beaten up by bullies, helping me say just the right things to everyone. I just wanted to use it to be happy and make people like me, y'know?" The voice went on, Sans feeling the kid was pouring out his heart. "Then I fell down here and it got different. I started feeling like my actions had real consequences and just...well, an eraser can erase the picture. But it doesn't mean you didn't draw the picture to begin with. So I went back one time, and one time only. Back to the beginning...and I never reset again. And I promised to never do it anymore." 

 

Sans's eyes slowly turned back to normal, a softer, gentler light entering the black sockets as he sighed. "you sound...older than you are."

 

"...I died about 8, 9 times." The kid's voice admitted. "And...I saw...the things I saw and did, you...you realize that you can't not own what you do. That's what Integrity means, right? Owning up to what you do." A deep, soft sigh through the door. "Me and another kid are here with Ms. Toriel. She's the old queen and she's really, really nice. I'm going to ask her to destroy the way out. That way nobody else can fall on into the Underground and die and have their souls claimed. This way they'll be safe." 

 

Sans stiffened. "...kid, I...I can understand you wanting to do that. i get that. it's really noble. but..." He trailed off. "...someone else already fell down before you, and...they're still here. you oughta know that." 

 

A sharp intake of breath through the door. Then, finally, a quiet, terrified question.

 

"What did they look like?"

 

"teenage girl with brown hair. she's got a clover belt and she's wearing a cross neck-"

 

"Oh GOD!" The kid sobbed out from the other side. "Frisk's mom?! She's HERE?!?" Sans could hear frantic breathing and pacing, a child desperately struggling to get a grip. "Oh no, no, that ain't good, that ain't good at all! Wh-what am I gonna do?! I...I gotta get her back here, to Frisk! Can...can you teleport her here?"

 

"i can try and go find her, kid. You want me to tell her her son Frisk is here?"

 

"Yes. Tell her Frisk and Neil Elliot are waiting for her in the Ruins. If you can just get her to the door, this can still be fixed." Neil said quickly. "I'll just get her inside with Frisk and destroy the door and it'll be fixed, yeah, that-that'll do it..." He muttered behind the door before Sans felt his cell phone ringing and picked it up. 

 

"hello?"

 

"Sans, you should probably have remembered that the cameras have an audio feed." Gaster's voice softly intoned on the other end, Sans turning to his left, and to the faint camera lens peeking out the snow-covered bush he now gazed at. "So there's some more humans in the Ruins section of the Underground?"

 

"...yeah." Sans whispered. 

 

"Well, I have good news. I've caught the teenage girl you were speaking of. Amazingly, she actually survived a full-on blast. It would appear she's actually immortal. The possibilities here are highly fascinating to examine...and we need two other Souls. Bring the children in the ruins out here. Tell them if they want the girl, they will have to come to my laboratory." Gaster calmly intoned. "We can gain all the remaining souls for study all at once!" 

 

"they'll know it's a trap." Sans said. "and you know one of them can RESET." 

 

"Yes, that is quite the tricky conundrum." Gaster admitted. "But your big brother's got a plan for that too. Go on and tell the child what you know."

 

Sans was quiet as he heard the child speak on the other side of the door. "S-Sans? Are you still there?"

 

"...this feels wrong." Sans mumbled softly through the phone. "...i can't...I can't do this."

 

"I know this is difficult for you. I don't delight in this either. But we have to bring hope to our people. And I want to do this so Asgore won't have to. He's been visiting the coffins every might and I think the guilt is driving him near insane. He's sleeping even less than I am." Gaster mumured quietly. "...go on. Tell the child the truth. I will be waiting."

 

With that, the call ended, and Sans sighed, closing his eyes as he turned around and knocked back on the door. "Kiddo...I got some bad news you ain't gonna like."

 

“What?”   
  
“...my...my older brother Gaster has your friend’s mom. he wants you both to come to his lab.”

 

“...” Silence. Stone, cold silence for what seemed to be a long, long time. Then, at last…

  
“I-I just, I…alright, I’ll...I’ll think of...SOMETHING.” Neil murmured. “I’ve...I gotta get Ms. Toriel to keep Frisk here. I’LL go rescue his mom. If I move quickly I might be able to get her out and get her back to the Ruins. Can you try and...stall your brother from hurting her?” He asked. “Or...y’know...going too far?” 

  
“i’ll do what I can, kiddo.”

 

“Thanks.” Neil’s panicked voice said, the tone dropping an octave. “I...oh God, I’m freaking out, I...I thought I’d have more TIME.” And with that, he was gone, Sans quietly taking in soft, careful breaths that faintly lingered in the chilly air...

 

…

 

…

 

…

 

...meanwhile, Alphys was hard at work inside her lap, goggles leveled over her eyes, her hands smoothly flying over an immense, keyboard-esque control console as she slightly bowed her head, music booming through the nearby speakers. She was manifesting her own magic as it freely flowed into Mettaton, into the new robotic body she was giving Napstablook’s cousin and it pumped like the beats from the speaker as she grinned. Alphys always felt a deep sense of pride whenever she was at work, head hunkered down, rutting her way through the roughest challenges. Some people floated through life, just about everything coming easy to them. Others only were at their best when they were rummaging through the table scraps, struggling just to get by. She was in the latter category, and she owned it. 

 

It had taken her an entire week of no sleep. But at long...long last...his body was ready, and just needed that final bit of spark to get it online. A final fail-safe in case things went bad, a way to fight as one. Her magic flowing through his...formerly HER...body. The tubes pumped into the faintly humanoid body, as veins pulsated over it with a soft yellowish glow, Alphys’s own body glittering with yellow light. 

 

**_Docta, docta, need you bad,_ ** ****_  
_ **_Call me, babe!_ ** ****_  
_ **_Docta, Docta, where you at?_ ** **_  
_ ** ****_Give me something!_

 

She turned up a dial, grinning to herself as Mettaton continued to sing, only his mouth moving, his eyes still closed and hair flopped over his face. The veins continued to pulse and glow as Alphys turned ANOTHER dial. 

  
**_I need your love,_ ** ****_  
_ **_I need your love,_ ** ****_  
_ **_I need your loviiiiing!_ ** **_  
_ ** ****_You got that kind of medicine that keeps me comin’!_

**_My body needs a heeeerooo,_ ** ****_  
_ **_Come and save me!_ ** ****_  
_ **_Something tells me yooouuu know how to save me!_ ** ****_  
_ **_I've been feeling reeaaaal low,_ ** **_  
_ ** ****_Oh, I need you!_

**_To come and rescue meeeee!_ **

 

Alphys grinned and her clawed yellow hands reached out, the faintly dinosaur-esque scientist’s eyes glittering like gems behind the goggles, a soft glow emanating from beneath as she gripped two immense, huge levers on either side of the dark grey control console. She tugged them down, hard, and the final burst of energy surged forth like a dam breaking, and Mettaton’s body twitched and sparked as he let out a deep gasp, and his eyes shot open wide. 

 

**_Make me come alive,_ **

**_Come on and turn me on!_ **

**_Touch me, save my life,_ **

**_Come on and turn me on!_ **

**_I’m too young to die,_ **

**_Come on and turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

 

Alphys smirked proudly, Mettaton slowly rising up from the chair he laid in, faint yellow smoke drifting off his body as she rubbed her hands together. She’d never been more delighted in her work. Never been more proud. Her finest, FINEST work.

 

**_Make me come alive,_ **

**_Come on and turn me on!_ **

**_Touch me, save my life,_ **

**_Come on and turn me on!_ **

**_I’m too young to die,_ **

**_Come on and turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

**_Turn me on!_ **

 

“Ohhhh yesssss.” Mettaton whispered as he rose off the table and looked his body over, his smooth hands exploring his lovely frame. “I love marvelous.”   
  
“Woop de doo for y’all.” Bonnie muttered, trapped inside a glass-esque cell to the far right, sitting in a chair as Gaster sat nearby in a chair, his eye sockets wide, his white pupils filled with awe.    
  
“Simply amazing!” He whispered. “Perfect synchronicity!” 

 

“I’m sure I’d be real impressed if I knew what the hell y’all were blabbin’ over.” Bonnie grumbled as Mettaton gave her an intrigued look and waltzed over to her, Gaster rising up.

  
“Perhaps she needs a little...LESSON about not mouthing off to her captors?” Mettaton inquired. “Besides, you did say you wanted to test to see if she really was immortal. And I SO want to see what this beautiful form can do.” He added, putting a hand over his chest.   
  
Bonnie’s eyes were stone cold as Gaster quietly looked from her to Mettaton. He seemed slightly reluctant...than nodded. “Very well.” He quietly remarked, and carefully focused. He held up his holey-palmed hand as he focused, and soft blue light engulfed Mettaton. “You’re blue now. That’s my attack.” He remarked with a small smile, Mettaton now being able to freely pass through the specialized glass as Bonnie darkly gazed back at the robot. Though her weapons had been stripped from her...she was not going to go gently into any dark night.

 

“Gimme your best shot, ya overgrown tin can.”   
  
“I was thinking more along the lines of…swiss army knife?” Mettaton asked, one hand shifting and shuddering, forming a large set of small weapons from a knife to a flail to a nunchaku as Bonnie held up her hands and clenched them into fists, Alphys gripping her controls with excited awe, her goggles held over her forehead as the two charged forth…

 

And meanwhile, Neil Elliot was in the kitchen with Toriel, his head slightly bowed.

  
“...so that’s what’s happening. I’m gonna try and go save her, and bring her back here. Then you can destroy the exit so nobody can get in or out.”   
  
Toriel gently laid her large, soft, furry white hand on his as he closed his eyes, and he heard her tender, musical voice speaking. “You have more skill and maturity in you than many adults I know.” She admitted. “And yet, you’re so YOUNG, Neil. I’m afraid for you.”   
  
“I’m afraid too.” Neil admitted. “But I wanna save her. That’s all I know. I might not have much of a plan, but...I can break her out. I’m a lot like Frisk. He and I can both “RESET” if things get too bad. Go back in time and make things right.”

 

Toriel took in a long, deep breath, her chest slowly rising and falling as she gripped his hand more tightly. “I’m just so scared for you. I...don’t want to lose another.”   
  
“I know how you feel. But I kinda feel like I NEED to do this.” Neil murmured. “A human made this mess. And a human needs to fix it.” 

 

Her breath was soft, her kiss softer as she placed it on his little forehead, ruffling his blonde hair as he clasped his hands together over hers. 

  
“Be safe.” She whispered.

 

“...I love you, mom.” He murmured back, giving her a quiet nod...and racing down the steps, into the basement, and towards the exit to the ruins. He no longer felt time was on his side. And he knew something horrifying was. Something lurking deep down inside him that had been awoken upon his return to the Underground. An ugly, hateful thing hiding under a rock that should have stayed there, awoken by his Level of Violence, a level Frisk didn’t have. 

 

_ “Why are you ignoring me? Your heart keeps calling my name.” _ He heard Chara’s voice whispering in his ear, knowing she was not going away anytime soon. Neil pushed the purple doorway before him open, walking across the long hallway towards the door that led out to Snowdin. 

 

“You’re...a mistake. A mistake I’m not repeating.” Neil mumbled as he felt the bitter chill of cold wind biting into him. Snowdin laid ahead...and he could hear the sound of dogs barking. The Royal Guard was on their way.

 

Neil Elliot rose up on his tippy toes, stretching his arms as he closed his eyes, and breathed in the deep icy wind as he heard the Dogamy and the Dogaressa’s voice ring out.

 

“That smell!”

  
“IDENTIFY YOURSELF!” 

 

Neil opened his eyes. He saw their white furred heads, their little black noses. He saw their piercingly deep black eyes, and the thick, awful axes they carried.

 

“Let’s  _ dance _ .” He said with a deep bow. 


	5. Putting on A Show in Snowdin

Neil Elliot stood there, in a pink tutu, facing down gigantic, axe-wielding, dark-hooded dogs. A child not even old enough to shave was facing down gigantic dogs with axes, who intended to slice him into silly putty, then steal his soul. Most would have been a bit...scared by this. Pants-wettingly so.

Well, it was a good thing Neil wasn't really wearing any pants. He WAS, however, severely regretting racing out into 30 degree weather with nothing but a pink ballerina outfit and ballet shoes on, and despite his best cheery smile, was clearly shaking more from cold than fear.

"Something smells...pink." The Dogaressa remarked aloud as she sniffed at the air, trying to focus in on the human child. "...it can't possibly be a human, can it? They said a human would come through here, but...is it a human?"

"It smells VERY pink." The Dogamy admitted with a nod at its beloved. "LOOKS rather pink too, even with my bad eyes I can see that. A little human girl? Is that what you are?" It inquired, Neil continuing to shiver in the cold as the wind nipped at him, and the Dogamy approached, looking like IT wanted to nip him.

Luckily, Neil had a plan. He waited until Dogamy got closer...closer...and then...

THWOOOM! With a bounding leap, he leapt high over the hooded dog as if playing leapfrog, then bounced right on top of the Dogaressa's head, landing behind her before doing a classic Karate Kid move...

Sweep the leg.

THA-THWOMP. Down she went, falling onto her side as Neil whipped about, the Dogamy growling and rushing forward, axe raised high. Neil took in a deep breath. He had died twice to the Dog couple when he'd been down to the Underground before, and he knew that the Dogamy always slashed forward and down, never side to side. So he swerved his body, the blade missing him by inches as he shot up and held up his knee, kneeing the Dogamy squarely in the muzzle and breaking the Snowdin Canine Unit member's nose.

"BAUGGGHH!" The Dogamy cried out, being knocked over into the snow and onto his beloved as Neil did a deep bow.

"Thank you, thank you, you've been a wonderful audience!"

"Oh, I think the show is only getting started." A voice rang out as Neil gasped, unable to properly turn around in time as he felt an almost icy-cold spear of pure blue magical energy piercing into him, its color as icy cold as his attacker's eyes as his lifeblood began to dribble down from his stabbed chest. Undyne's spear had found his mark and-

**RESET**

Now he was right back where he'd been only a few moments ago, and instead of a bow to the Dogamy and Dogaressa, he turned around, giving a bow to the very surprised Undyne, who stared at him behind her helmeted head as the rest of the Snowdin Canine Unit stared in surprise. "More people to watch me perform? I'm always happy for a good audience." Neil admitted, raising himself up and putting a hand on his chest. "I'm Neil Elliot. If you don't mind, I'd like you to just let me go to the lab? I'm supposed to meet Dr. Gaster."

"Ohhhh no you don't." Undyne told him, shaking her head as she manifested a spear, and hunched it over her shoulder. "I'm not interested in whatever Gaster wants with you. I don't care about his stupid little plans. We want your soul, human. So be a good little boy and hand it over, _sissy_."

Neil felt a bit of anger enter him. "Sissy? What, because I take ballet?!" He demanded to know.

The Snowdin Canine Unit began to giggle and chuckle, the Dogamy and the Dogaressa rising up.

"He's a boy?!" The Dogamy remarked. "In Heaven's name, why are you wearing a **tutu**?!"

"What sort of boy takes ballet?!" The Dogaressa groaned, shaking her head as Neil began to feel his cheeks flush. It was like his first weeks of school all over again, like being pointed at, mocked, everyone laughing, sneering, their faces filled with contempt at the young, blonde-haired lad exiting the gym after the lesson was over. A boy taking ballet. There were some things you just. didn't. do.

"What kinda MAN do you think you're gonna grow up to be if you're pretending to be a girl?" Undyne sniggered. "Ballet is for **women**! Just like shooting guns and wearing no shirt as you swing your gigantic sword is for guys." She added with a proud, shit-eating grin clearly shining out from behind her helmet. Neil could almost SEE it through the metal. He sure as Hell could HEAR it! "Guys don't take that dumb, girly-girl stuff! Hosting dinner parties, sure. Looking effeminate, yeah! Long hair, that's just fine, but...ballet!? What, **did your balls drop off!?** " She laughed.

"What a pussy!" Doggo snorted, lighting up a doggie bone and beginning to smoke it, sniggering a bit. "You're a little pussy, kid!"

Neil was now boiling mad. He'd never, EVER heard insults this bad before. As awful as some of the kids had been in school had been to him during the first few weeks of him taking ballet lessons at Squadron Line, none...NONE had ever, ever called him the names these people were. He was now shaking more from fury than from cold or fear, and his fists were tightly clenching. He wanted these people to hurt, and he wanted to be the one that hurt them. Over...and over. A cold, dark sense of purpose filled him as he heard Chara's soft whisper...

_"Come on, partner. You know what you have to do."_

Normally, he would have ignored her. But he was just...so... _ **mad**_.

And so, he clapped his hands together, eyes closed, everyone blinking as he tapped his foot on the snowy ground below. They could almost feel the rhythm flowing through the air, hear the music of the Underground being tapped into as he began to sing in a distinctly Hispanic-flavored fashion, hot passion filling his lungs as he shot forward, and clasped Undyne's hands, actually dipping her down, his face inches from hers! Naturally...she just stared in muted shock.

"I ache for the touch of your lips, dear! But much more for the touch of your WHIPS dear!" He proclaimed, her helmet flopping off her head from the dip as she stared at him with her singular yellow eye, her ponytail flopping back, a stupefied expression on her face. "You can raise welts...like nobody else as we DANCE!"

THWOMP! He headbutted her face, some blood actually splurting forth from her forehead from the force, milky and slippery, letting go of her as he leapt backwards and did a pose. "To the Masochism tango!"

Doggo growled, his ears flattening against his head as he launched forward, his knives held tightly in his paws, swinging at Neil, who leapt backwards, spinning about to avoid his strikes. "Let our love be a flame, not an ember! Say it's me that you want to dismember!"

"Oh believe me, I DO!" Undyne yelled out, rising up from the snow, trying to find a good shot with one of her spears, but Doggo was in the way. The Snowdin Canine Unit Member then swung both knives at Neil as Lesser Dog shot forward as well, trying to tackle Neil when he ducked to avoid Doggo's strike. Doggo tackled Neil, slamming him into the snowy ground, but then Neil KICKED with both legs, Doggo gaping in surprise as Lesser Dog went sailing up...up! He spun about like a football in midair before sailing back down as Neil rose up, stepped back...

And then kicked him right into Doggo. Doggo was sent flying with Lesser Dog into a nearby tree, knocking it over with a mighty crash as Neil spun about before striking another pose. "Blacken my eye! Set fire to my tie as we dance to the Masochism Tango!" He proclaimed, leaping over to the barely-able-to-rise Lesser Dog, Doggo quite unconcious as Lesser Dog's very SOUL now seemed to flicker about, almost wanting to escape from the body! It looked as though he was inches from death, and Undyne gasped as Neil clutched it in one hand. "At your command! Before you here I stand! My heart is in my hand!...YECCH." He gave the SOUL a little squeeze, almost threateningly, Lesser Doggo shuddering a bit before Neil thrust the white heart right back into Lesser Dog's chest. Undyne gave Neil a dirty look as he took a single finger and pushed the armor-wearing white Pomeranian dog back, making him THWOMP right onto the unconscious Doggo.

"It's here that I must beee!" Neil sang out.

"You won't be here for long!" Undyne roared out, as the much larger, more impressive Greater Dog launched forward, its immense axe swinging about, left and right, up and down, trying to slice and dice Neil as he spun away from the dog, spinning right round, baby, right round, like a RECORD, baby!

"My heart entreats, just hear those savage beats! And go put on your cleats, and come and trample me!" Neil laughed in delight, ducking and swerving to avoid Greater Doggo's swiping strikes of his axe blade before leaping up and into a tree, grabbing hold tightly as he began ripping off a branch to make...of course...a stick. With a hard yank, he snapped it off, then hopped down, Greater Dog seeing the stick, mouth agape...before it began to pant heavily, bouncing up and down. Neil pretended to throw it, and Greater Dog bounded off, Neil turning back to the Dogamy and the Dogaressa, who were now standing by Undyne...

Who had her arm up, a HOST of blue spears having manifested high above her head. Oh dear. This could be tricky. Neil took in a deep breath, Undyne thrusting her armored arm forward as the spears barreled towards him in a thick wave, Neil leaping higher than he ever had before, even though a few spears knicked the sides of his legs and feet. He spun about, ducking and diving, ignoring the pain shooting through his legs as he continued to inch closer and closer to Undyne, working his way through the onslaught of spears. "Your heart is hard as stone or mahogany! That's why I'm in such exquisite agony!"

"Really, I thought it was my spears." Undyne growled, her one eye bulging furiously. Why in the Hell was this kid not dead yet!?

"My soul is on fire; it's a flame with desire!" Neil then finally got close enough. Bursting forward, ignoring the spear that slashed across one of his shoulders, he swept his leg forward and kicked high, knocking Undyne back and flat onto the snowy ground before doing a twisting leg-sweep that knocked the Dogaressa and the Dogamy onto the ground below as well. "Which is why I perspire when we tango!" He proclaimed, before giving another leap up, landing right on top of Undyne, and kicking at her face. THWACK, THWACK, THWACK! He kicked again, again, AGAIN, growling angrily. Call HIM a pussy, would they? He ought to-

He stopped, blinking a bit as he stepped off of her, panting heavily, clutching his chest as it slowly rose and fell. Undyne was glowering balefully at him, her own lifeblood oozing down from her near-broken jaw, a still-cracked-open forehead as she furiously growled. "I-I'm so-sorry, I...I didn't..." Neil murmured, realizing he'd gone too far.

Again.

_"Come on, partner. Finish it."_

"...NO!" Neil screamed out, racing away from the three, barreling off towards the river, heading for where he knew a certain, special monster would be. The cloaked and hooded Riverman, who ran a boat service for the Underground, taking people along the loooong underground river that ran all the way from Snowdin to Waterfall to Hotland. Panting and heaving, he approached the small dock, the hooded, unknown monster turning to him, tilting its head to the side.

"I am the Riverman. Or am I the Riverwoman? It doesn't really matter. I can take wherever you need to go." It informed him with a calm nod of its head. "Where shall you go?"

"Take me to Hotland, please! I need to get to the laboratory there." Neil said, turning around, seeing Undyne was getting back up, murder in her eye. "As fast as you can!"

"Tra la la. Climb on in." The Riverman remarked with a little whistle, Neil hopping into the boat as it rose out of the water, growing tiny little legs before barreling down the river, Undyne's furious roar echoing through the air as Neil sighed, flopping down into the boat as he laid on his back. He looked up at the almost endless darkness that was the roof of the Underground, seeing the stalactites passing by, the shimmering fake stars that were the glowing blue gems embedded in the walls...and he could remember that ugly, hateful urge that had crept up when he'd held Lesser Dog's soul...when he'd been kicking at Undyne's face...

That awful, rotten, painful urge. The temptation to HURT. To hurt like he'd been hurt. But no. NO. He'd promised himself to never do that again. He couldn't. He wouldn't.

"I feel so dirty." Neil whispered, covering his face, shuddering in disgust, not cold nor fear as he shook his head back and forth. "...dirty, dirty, _dirty_..." He murmured, unaware the Riverperson was staring down at him, turning away from the river, eyes gleaming out from the dark recesses beneath...

...

...

...

...Asgore sighed as he put down the cell phone. Undyne had a very bad report. The human had utterly decimated the Snowdin Canine Unit. They were barely still standing, and Undyne was in the worst shape of all. She was getting treated at the inn with the others and her mouth had been so filled with blood that it had been hard to understand her. Well, that, combined with the swears she'd belched out, along with the very graphic promises of what she'd do with the human when she caught him.

Asgore sighed, hanging his bearded head, holding it in his mighty hands as he stared at the nearby mirror across the room in his bedroom. He stared long and hard at the face that gazed back. It seemed so much older now. So much sadder, more depressed and more dejected. How long had it been since he was happy? How long had it been since he'd last...smiled? Really smiled?

He thought back to his family. He thought of the children dead because of what he'd done.

And he let the tears come.

_**Let it all flow out, like a river running!** _   
_**You cannot deny this...that your kingdom's falling again...** _   
_**It never eeeeends...** _

_**You gotta see your life will end in shambles,** _   
_**you learn to breathe, but you can see you're drowning!** _   
_**We rise and fall into a different level,** _   
_**Let your life drain out!** _

_**You're fighting back, don't know what you've been thinking!** _   
_**A walking burden, can't you see you're sinking?!** _   
_**Hiding in shadows, can you fight your demons,** _   
_**Can you face yourseeeeelf?** _

Neil covered his face with one arm, trying not to let the whisper of Chara dig into his mind. But it was becoming hard. With every battle he took part in, he knew Chara's influence would grow if he used violence at all. They fed off that Level of Violence, and he was terrified of the monster that was staring back at him from the reflection in the water. A monster that was him, and yet not him at all. Caked in dust and milky blood, eyes almost red. A sight he'd ignored so much until the day he'd murdered Undyne, and beat her to death, sinking into her remains beneath him...

"...so...dirty." He whispered, looking at his hands, quivering and shaking, almost feeling her pieces sliding down his fingers...

_**You will rise and fall...like a current about to end!** _   
_**You could end it all...but then what's left now to defeeend?** _   
_**It never eeeeeends...** _

_**You gotta see your life will end in shambles,** _   
_**you learn to breathe, but you can see you're drowning!** _   
_**We rise and fall into a different level,** _   
_**Let your life drain out!** _

_**You're fighting back, don't know what you've been thinking!** _   
_**A walking burden, can't you see you're sinking?!** _   
_**Hiding in shadows, can you fight your demons,** _   
_**Can you face yourseeeeelf?** _

**"I know that you might think that our king isn't fair...leaves you gasping for air, breathing all this despaaair! This ocean of haaaaate!"** The Riverperson softly sang out, Neil shuddering as he rose up, looking into its almost ethereal eyes that softly glowed out from within. He could feel it staring into his soul. He shook slightly, the Riverperson gazing intently, an almost soulless white into deep blue.

_**You gotta see your life will end in shambles,** _   
_**you learn to breathe, but you can see you're drowning!** _   
_**We rise and fall into a different level,** _   
_**Let your life drain out!** _

_**You're fighting back, don't know what you've been thinking!** _   
_**A walking burden, can't you see you're sinking?!** _   
_**Hiding in shadows, can you fight your demons,** _   
_**Can you face yourseeeeelf?** _

"...I don't...know." Neil whispered at last, hanging his head. "I'm afraid of what I can do. I'm really...really _scared_." He admitted. "When I first found out I had this power, it was...it was awesome! Who WOULDN'T want to undo every mistake they've made and do things perfectly? I used it to best bullies. To make friends. To avoid getting hurt and to learn everything I could ever need to know, and I loved it! I loved ALL of it!" He sighed and hung his head, the blonde hair flopping down. "But...then I started to get the consequences. That...that even then, what I did had an impact. If not on others, then on ME. A lot on me. And I could feel the weight dragging me down, almost drowning me. And I'm scared of what I can become. Scared of the worst of me. Scared that I'll look back in my reflection, and I'll see what everyone knows about me...that I'm really just a jerk. A jerk that just likes hurting people because I can get away with it."

"Is that what you think they think about you?" The Riverperson softly inquired, the boat continuing to glide along, though much slower now. "That you will only be judged by the worst you've shown?"

"Isn't that how **everyone's** judged? You remember the bad stuff more than the good."

The Riverperson sighed and then sat down across from Neil, looking into the child's face, its voice becoming warmer, softer. "Do you know who our first king was? Grillby, the owner and bartender of the Bar and Grill in Snowdin." He remarked, Neil sounding surprised by this, his face looking confused as Riverperson continued their tale. "He was...dark. He didn't much like humans at all. And he didn't take prisoners. He always made sure any we got would be rounded up and burned during the war. With him personally doing the burning."

Neil wasn't sure if he wanted to keep listening, but he stayed rooted to the spot, quietly staring as Riverperson went on. "Then one day, Grillby was standing before a bonfire, having begun to burn alive more prisoners. Someone just...just casually tossed a child at the fire. I don't remember who. Nobody does, to this day. Or perhaps...they don't want to own up to it. I think the latter is more likely. But when Grillby saw this, saw the child flopping just to the edge of the fire, I remember his expression. He'd never, EVER seen an infant human before, and he looked positively horrified at the sight, for it was still alive, and he...he couldn't bring himself to harm it. So he rushes down, hands outstretched. He lifts the youngling up into his arms to try and get it away from the fire, but he didn't realize that-"

Riverperson shuddered, his head hanging low before he spoke again. "...he had forgotten that he hadn't turned down the fire on his body. That it was still raging and furious and...normal people can't touch an elemental when they're like that. An elemental of flame has to turn their body temperature down through will in order to let others touch them. It's a sign of trust and respect, and...and Grillby wasn't THINKING, he was just trying to pick the child up and get it away, but-but it...it was burned in his arms on its back and it almost shrivelled up like cooked meat and so I snatched it away, and Grillby is just staring at his hands, and at the now dead child in my arms..."

Neil stared silently, looking deep into the Riverperson's dark hood, almost seeing the tears streaming down Riverperson's face. "And...and it was _gone_. Just like that. Grillby hadn't meant to. But...after that, he stepped down from being king. But nobody really remembers that. They remember him in his little tuxedo. Wearing his glasses. The softness behind his eyes, with him cleaning off the bar...or cleaning out a glass. Because..." River took in a deep breath. "...he took the time to...to change. To show he was different. Better. But that's how people remember him. They remember the day-to-day kindness he showed. That one, awful moment...as terrible as it was...it didn't define him, because he didn't LET it define him."

Riverperson's head rose up. "You don't need to let the worst moments of your life define you any more than it defined Grillby. Your kindness, your...Integrity...can define you. If you only let it."

Neil was quiet for what seemed to be a long, long time as the boat came to a halt in Hotland, and he held his hands in his lap. His head hung low before, at last, he lifted it up. "You're right." He murmured. "I'll...I'll try. Try not to let the worst of me be what others see. I'll try to take responsibility. I'll try to be careful."

The Riverperson rose up, and gave a sage nod, Neil exiting the boat as the intense warmth of Hotland bathed over Neil. He stepped across the dusty natural pathways, the immense laboratory off in the distance...where he knew Bonnie laid.

"...I'm coming." He promised. "I'll have you out of there and with Frisk before you know it."


	6. Monster, Man and Machine

Frisk slowly made his way through the Ruins, towards that spot. That one spot he kept visiting over and over. Sometimes he'd see Flowey there, far-off in the distance, glaring at him. Sometimes a Froggit or another monster would come by. But more often than not, like this evening, like the approaching night...he was alone.

He slowly approached it, and looked high, higher, higher. There it was, up in the heavens, the soft light from above billowing down. There it was...the hole that he'd fallen into.

There it was.

The night sky. And the faintest glimmer of real stars.

And so he laid there in the flowers, and just rested on his back, and he quietly watched. He thought of the many, many nights he'd spent stargazing with his mother. He remembered the tune of her harmonica wafting through the air as the night sky's quilt of speckled lights bathed down upon them.

He remembered the first time she'd let him try it, and the feel of the wind on his face.

And he would cry.

…

…

…

...The little blonde human was an odd sight in the intense heat of hotland. The harsh humidity that bathed over the hot, reddish/brown ground, the steely walkways high over magma far below, the impressively immense gleaming CORE off in the distance, an almost alien structure rising out of the magma to provide the energy the Underground needed...all of that was nothing. Nothing, when you compared it to a little blonde boy in a vivid pink tutu and ballet shoes to match. He ran as fast as he could across the steely walkways, and then flattened himself behind a large rocky outcropping, hearing someone was approaching. Neil Elliot hid as close to the rock as he could, even over the hiss of steam echoing out from tubes that expelled their contents out into the air, cooling off "The CORE", contributing to energy production, and briefly peeked over the side of the rock before slinking back.

A cat-like monster in a bright yellow longsleeve shirt and pants was barreling towards a stand that had been far, far off in the distance, on a large rocky naturally-hewn platform, where a purple monster was lying behind a looooong table. The cat panted and heaved, eyes twinkling behind his glasses as the purple spider-esque monster calmly rested one pair of arms over her chest, one arm holding a pistol under the table, the other holding out a hand and gesturing at the many baked goods laid out upon the aforementioned table. There were croissants, bagels, doughnuts, scones, some with lovely and delicious-looking frosting on top, others with frosting and sprinkles, some having chocolate chips in them, others looking like they were "gluten-free" or the like, being an odd color that made Neil think of the kind of stuff his dad would call "liberal food".

"Well?"

"Um...I'll take a...I'll take a scone, but I...I only have 2000 Gold, I can't p-pay off the tab I've accrued just yet..."

"You've had...a week." The spider-like monster remarked, her black hair tied into little wafts at the top of her head whilst other locks flowed down the side of her head, a reddish/purple bow tied atop her head. She wore pantaloons and high-heel boots of red and black to match her faintly Victorian-Era outfit, and she had many gleaming, unnaturally beetle-black eyes. "...a week. I don't much care for you ducking me, you little bitch."

"I...I'm sorry Muffet, I...I'll just skip the scone, b-best get off to work at the lower level of the lab..." The cat-like monster whimpered fearfully, his body shaking and shuddering in terror.

"You better have my money." She whispered darkly, her eyes going almost unnaturally wide as her tongue, so disturbingly, disgustingly black, lapped over her dark purple lips in a slow, deliberate manner as the cat monster took a nervous step back. "Bitch better have my money."

"I...I mean..."

_**"Bitch better have my money!"**_ Muffet growled furiously.

"I...er..."

_**"PAY ME WHAT YOU OWE ME!"** _ Muffet roared angrily, holding up the pistol in her other hand, giving him a dark, foul, furious grin that indicated she was very much gonna "bust a cap in his ass". He immediately began sobbing, turning out all his pockets and pouring everything inside them out onto the table as she smirked in pride.

Meanwhile, Neil was inching around the back way, going behind Muffet, slooowly crawling along the ground as she kept her many eyes upon the cat monster in front of her. He kept crawling further and further, finally making his way towards a set of stairs, seeing an elevator not too far away. More importantly...he saw the elevator leading down had a jumping-off point that would, if he timed it right upon sliding down it...land him right on top of a lower level of the laboratory within Hotland. He took in a deep breath, putting out a hand.

He cringed. OOOGH. It was hot. He wasn't surprised. Much like the other metallic surfaces here, it too was hot, best suited for quick, fast movement. He'd have to be really, really quick about this. Carefully adjusting himself as best he could, he leapt through the air, grabbing hold of the elevator-

Slipping off, falling down, down, towards the barreling, hazing, immense heat as Neil let out a gasp, covering his face, inches from the magma when-

**RESET**

He panted, clutching at his chest, his heart throbbing and pulsating as he took in deep, long breaths. He had to be more careful. He reached out, arms wrapping around the elevator as best he could, ignoring the agonizing pain that was slowly building in his arms. For a moment he almost wished he'd changed into something else, but he wasn't gonna take off his ballet uniform.

This was a part of his identity. This was who he was. He wasn't ashamed to admit he was into ballet. It was something he was good at, something he was passionate about, something that he loved, and he was not going to be shamed into getting rid of it by any teacher, any student, not by his dad, not by his foes, not by that STUPID voice of Chara trying to worm its way into his head.

"You look like a wuss. It's pretty sad." Chara's voice rang in his mind as Neil ignored the singing heat sticking into his arms and legs as he slid down the elevator, then took a flying leap off, landing on top of the surface of the laboratory. Though it was warm, it was less hot than the elevator, and he scrambled back up to his feet, staggering about a bit before making his way over to a vent shaft. He tugged on it, hard, and with a loud KRA-KROOOM, he pulled the top off, and looked down.

He could crawl in, alright. There wasn't much of a drop, and he felt cool, almost chilly air below. He wasn't going to be roasted going in. Besides, he could always RESET if things got really bad. He took in a deep breath, then slid in, unaware cameras had picked up his every move.

Neil had always been at his best when giving it his all to do what was right. He was not, however, without a reckless streak. And it might end up costing him dearly. Dr. Gaster rubbed his skeletal chin thoughtfully as he analyzed the footage before him whilst a voice rang out through the air from down the hall.

"Had enough yet?"

"...you...don't...scare me...ya overgrown...swiss army knife..."

Bonnie Hatfield-McCoy was not having a very good time of it. It was true, she'd gotten quite a few good punches and kicks on Mettaton's dazzling battle body as he held his svelte legs up high, flexing them nonchalantly, though his face showed clear, obvious anger and annoyance and a bit of fury...for she'd broken his lip, and left him with a cracked chestplate. But he'd actually killed her four times now, with a perforated lung, shattered ribs, a heart he'd literally ripped out, and once a snapped neck from when he'd struck her so hard in the chest she'd flew headfirst into the wall, making a Bonnie-shaped dent.

Now she was trying to stand with a broken left arm and several broken ribs, holding up her other fist as she grinned back at the robot, who put his legs back down upon the ground with a growl. "You'd like to die a fifth time?"

Bonnie grinned back. Blood was freely pouring from her ribs and trickled slightly down the edge of her mouth.

"I have to say, I'm getting quite a bit of lovely data on fighting humans from you. It's good you fight so dirty-" Mettaton intoned.

He didn't get to say anything else. She flung a splatter of blood at his face as Gaster turned away from the cameras following Neil. Now HE was distracted, barreling towards the cell she was in, seeing Mettaton had been blinded and that Bonnie had shot forward. She was using her teeth now, trying to essentially rip out Mettaton's throat. Gaster shuddered as Mettaton managed to shove her off, Bonnie still trying to rise up, pushing herself off the ground on her one good arm as Mettaton rubbed over his almost-torn-out throat. She'd actually punctured the steely skin.

"My flesh can be repaired easily, girl. And I won't tire like you do." Mettaton said as Bonnie tried to lift herself up, actually getting back to her feet as Gaster felt ice bathe over his insides.

"Justice" was the trait closest to "Determination". The ability to keep moving forward, no matter what. The desire to never give up and never give in. And though Bonnie's soul blazed with Justice, it was not hard to see why the two traits were almost like brother and sister, for the pursuit of justice so often intertwined with Determination. To see justice done no matter what required a kind of continuous refusal to give in. Even a refusal to die, sometimes.

Though her body might be screaming for her to stop, to die...her soul?

_It refused._

"That's enough, Mettaton." Gaster said firmly. "The OTHER human is in here. He thinks he snuck in stealthily. Heal yourself and then seek him out. We could use another test specimen and...of course...another human soul." The skeleton monster said, putting his holed hands behind his back as Mettaton left the cell, Bonnie trying to rush after him only for Dr. Gaster to hold up a hand.

He snapped his fingers, her form freezing in place thanks to his magic as he shook his head back and forth. "Don't make this difficult." He informed her as he then held up his other hand as it levitated over a small candy bar from a desk next door. "I'll try to tend to your injuries with a bit of magical food. You should save your strength for when the other arrives. He will need comfort when his end comes. It's a cruel, sad thing to die alone."

Bonnie squirmed in midair, shaking about as she glared balefully at him. "Y'all gonna get my boot up her bony ass."

"Joke's on you, skeleton's don't HAVE asses." Gaster said, sticking out his tongue in a defiant, smug display of pettiness. He immediately regretted this, because she GRABBED the bluish tongue, trying to tug it out of his mouth as he hollered and yelled, his voice muffled as Sans, watching from a nearby hallway, began laughing hysterically even as Gaster managed to force her to let go of him.

If Skeletons didn't have asses, why did it feel like he'd just made himself into one?

Meanwhile, Neil inched down the hallway, taking in deep, long breaths, shrouded in the inky blackness that permeated the world about him. He panted and heaved, slowly making his way towards a doorway off in the distance, faintly hearing music drifting through the air, getting closer and closer. Finally putting his head towards a crack in the door, he saw a figure he hadn't expected to see.

He was a humanoid robot, complete with showoffy black locks of hair, a very refined, formly set of limbs, quite a fine, tight rear, a beautiful black body with dazzling hands and almost vein-like synthetic lines running across his frame. He looked positively "fabulous", as if he was the very word personified, and was putting the finishing touches on a formerly-nasty wound on his neck.

"Ugh. Hateful little blonde brat. That human has no idea how to behave. She really is a country bumpkin, isn't she? A living Jeff Foxworthy joke!"

Neil could easily guess who this robot was talking about. There was no doubt he was referring to Bonnie. He carefully inched into the room, looking around for a weapon, seeing something was in the closet...something big and metal! Perfect! He slid across the floor, sliding into the slightly-open closet, juuuuust barely squeaking in as he picked up the-

...award? He blinked. It was a large microphone-shaped award for "Greatest TV Personality in the Underground" as he gaped stupidly at it, suddenly realizing the robot was looking over his appearance in the mirror, brushing his hair back. "My Lord, Mettaton, look at you. You're BEAUTIFUL." He whispered to himself.

_**"With a new day upon us, it's time to be honest,** _

_**follow my dreams and to face! A life of delusion and gender confusion,** _

_**that no longer will be the case!"** _

"He's...not gonna..." Neil gaped. He WOULDN'T!

But he would. Mettaton was that self-indulgent, that full-of-himself. That flamboyant.

_**"I didn't just want army men or basketballs! I wanted to dress up just like a Barbie Doll! Dressing up in a human's clothing!"**_ Mettaton proclaimed, putting a hand on his chest as he spun through the air, it was as if all the room had become a giant stage. Lights turned off, then refocused solely upon him as he dramatically tilted his head down. _**"My whole life feeling masculine and feminine! Trapped between a woman and between a man! Truly a ghost of Christmas Past!"**_

"Wait. Is he a...?" Neil wondered inwardly.

_**"Now it feels like the very first time! Cuz it's going to be the very first time!** _

_**My body! Feels right to me! Yes, I know that I'm looking good! Just like I always would,** _

_**It's my! First mission as a humaaaan!"**_ Mettaton proclaimed, holding one hand up high, eyes shut, mouth belting out almost in a perfect soprano.

"...this is weird." Neil thought inwardly. He'd seen strange things before, but this took the cake. He just didn't "get" people like Mettaton. He didn't understand their concern over identity. He tried to connect it to his own desire to do ballet, something usually "girly", but this seemed a step beyond. It wasn't "I want to do something traditionally girly", it was "I want to look like a different species because I feel like one on the inside". Perhaps it was his dad's Midwestern upbringing digging into him, and he didn't REALLY want to judge, but he couldn't help it. This felt weird. Just weird. Being human wasn't that big a deal to him. After all, humans couldn't do magic!

Okay, HE could but-

_**"Alphys constructed up a pair of genitals! Got me snazzy legs and bones made out of metal bars! The Underground will LOVE a guy like me!"**_ Mettaton proclaimed, sexily shaking his body in front of the mirror, putting a rose from a desk drawer into his mouth and biting down on it, suggestively raising his eyebrows up and down over his face. _**"Got a handsome face and a perky chest! My latest season's gonna be the best, it's my first TV season as a humaaaaan!"**_

Neil cringed. The guy had a lovely voice, sure! But he was yelling so loudly and so close to Neil that it was almost like being screamed at by his dad. He wished Mettaton would leave already, he couldn't take much more of-

_**"Now I'm finally happy cuz I made my goal!"**_ Mettaton proclaimed as he held up the rose in one hand, placing his other hand across his chest. _**"To be a post-operative transexual! Not just a pretty ladyyyy! Now it feels like the very first time! Cuz it's going to be the very first time! My body! Feels right to me! Yes, I know that I'm looking good! Just like I always would, It's my! First mission as a humaaaan!"**_

He tossed the rose dramatically through the air, leaning-and-dabbing dramatically before swooping over to the closet, spreading it wide, reaching in to get a picture that was on a shelf above, of two ghost-like monsters, one rather white and nonchalant with faintly sunken, sad eyes, the other pink and vibrant and peppy. _**"Humaaaaaaan!"**_ Mettaton sang out one final time...

Before he noticed Neil looking up at him.

Neil swung the hard metal award.

Needless to say, Mettaton was soon curled up on the floor of his room, quietly sobbing and whimpering, tears brimming in his metal eyes as the award laid nearby, the poor ghost-turned-robot having endured an awful blow to his nuts by an offender who bolted, the poor robot now truly a miserable wrench-

"Shut...up!" Neil snarled at Chara. "If you make one more stupid robot joke!"

" _Oh, come on. That was funny and you know it."_ Chara's voice rang within his head. " _Didn't it give you a bit of satisfaction to see that prideful, arrogant robot taken down a peg? Perhaps literally, maybe they're made out of-"_

"EW-EW-EW!" Neil said, brushing over his hair. "Dirty-dirty-dirty! You know WAY too much about adult stuff! Were you listenin' outside your mom and dad's bedroom every night?! Creep!" Finally, he barreled into a nearby doorway, pushing it open before ducking back out. YIKES! He'd almost run right into that cat worker he'd seen before!

"See ya, Sans." The cat worker remarked, leaving the room with several other monsters as they seemed to not notice Neil, who had hidden just in time behind a water cooler. A few moments later, Sans made his way out of the room, over to the water cooler. Neil was SURE that he'd see him...but Sans just approached one side of the water cooler, picked out a cup, then put it under, turning it on. He took a long drink, then began to speak.

"You know...if I was a human, I wonder where I'd go if I was looking for a friend? I'd say he might be on the **right** track if he just kept on the **straight and narrow** for a little while." The fat, skeletal monster intoned calmly. "Ah, but I gotta get back to my room. I recorded the " **West Wing"** and I don't wanna miss the end of the season." Sans remarked calmly.

Neil stayed stock still. Wait. Was the skeleton trying to...he was! He was helping him again! He looked up, seeing the cameras on the walls, as if noticing them for the first time. Stupid. STUPID, STUPID, STUPID. Why hadn't he thought about that sooner? And this skeletal monster...Sans...was risking so much to try and help him and here he was, just blindly running around a laboratory he had no experience being in and no idea where anything was! Why hadn't he thought things out more carefully?!

He kept his hands over his mouth, pretending to hold in a breath but whispered out, behind the hands…

"Thank you." He murmured, eyes closing.

Sans walked off in the direction the other monsters went, humming "Thank You For Being A Friend", Neil trying to suppress a distinct snorting laugh. It really did feel good to know that there was someone looking out for him. At long last, when Sans had vanished far off in the distance, Neil took a deep breath, then bolted down the hall. Straight, straight...then make the first right he could, heading towards the "West Wing". As he ran, his hair flopped about, his blue eyes blazing. He was going to get Bonnie out of here, if it was the last thing he did.

…

…

…

...Frisk slowly made his way through the Ruins, towards that spot. He laid there in the flowers, and just rested on his back, and he quietly watched. He thought of his mother. He thought of the wind. He thought of the stars in the night sky. He thought of the feel of his mother's harmonica in his mouth as he tried to play his first notes.

He thought about how he might never feel any of that again.

And he decided he wasn't going to cry anymore.

He was going to move forward. He needed to talk to Toriel, and he knew what to say as he heard her approach, and saw her eyes staring down at him, shocked and surprised at how he was crying...and yet looking more adult, more happy, than she'd seen him all this time he'd now spent with her.

"Teach me how to defend myself. Teach me to do what you do. Really teach me to tap into the song of the Underground." He asked. "Teach me EVERYTHING."

A smile.

"Yes, my child. I will."


	7. A Flowery Finale?

Bonnie Hatfield-McCoy was barely clinging to life when Neil found her in the cell. She was slumped against the wall, her head bowed, panting and heaving with her chest slowly rising and falling. Her breath was hoarse and ragged, her tone almost a raspy whisper as she slowly raised her head, and then turned to look to the side ever-so-slightly. "Mah...hat..." She mumbled out to Neil. Neil Elliot blinked stupidly. What the heck did she mean by-oh. OH. He realized her cowboy hat had fallen off, and she wanted it back on her head, even though her skull was matted with dried blood. He carefully placed it back atop her head, apologetically smiling up at her. The blonde-haired, blue-eyed preteen looked into the brown-haired teenager's eyes, blue into green as she chuckled a bit, letting him help her up and try to stagger towards the cell door. "I'm awfully sorry puttin' y'all through this." She apologetically admitted to Neil. "Y'all had to go through so much just to get to me." 

"I'm getting you to Frisk, and then we're going to destroy the door to the Ruins. Nobody will be able to get to you, or ever get any more human souls." Neil insisted quietly as he "oofed" with every step, the two getting closer and closer to the cell door, now inching their way down the hall...as the lights suddenly turned off, and a string of floor lights flooded on, illuminating a path. "...oh hell. I think we've been spotted."  
  
"Correct." A voice rang out from the PDA system as Neil inwardly groaned, hearing Dr. Gaster's voice ringing out, calm and collected. "Did you really think I WOULDN'T notice you breaking into my laboratory? My boy, for all your finesse and skill I see in your ballet moves, you've got the stealth of a very loud mountain goat." The skeleton monster intoned, and Neil was SURE that the doctor was rubbing his temples and shaking his head back and forth, scarcely able to get out the words he was saying. "I mean, the only thing you weren't doing was literally humming the James Bond theme." 

Neil deeply blushed. "Well, the first time I went through the lab about a year ago..." He muttered under his breath.   
  
But Dr. Gaster had overheard that. He steepled his bony fingers, Neil continuously moving across the hallway floors, taking Bonnie with him. "How many times have you ever RESET?"  
  
"Lost count." Neil snapped. He did not want to talk about this. He did not want to be psychoanalyzed. He didn't like the idea of this scientist looking at him like something under a microscope. He had to get Bonnie some magical food. What they needed, without a doubt, was to get to the kitchen, and he could smell coffee coming up on his right. One of the doors had to lead to an employee lounge, if he could just see which one...

He pushed doors open again and again as W.D Gaster spoke up again. "I imagine the first time you learned of your abilities, it was fascinating to you. A power nobody else had. An entire world opening up before you. I remember when I first gained mastery over multiple magics, and my parents were proud as could be. Yet they couldn't compare to the sheer joy I felt at knowing I could do things nobody around me could. That I could COMBINE magical spells. I felt a sense of furtive, dark delight, like knowing I'd found a hidden treasure and not wanting to tell anyone." 

Neil pushed open another door. A broom closet. Another door. A bathroom. 

"I of course began to exploit this little gift. I'd use it to beat others and win bets. I tested the limits of science and magic in my laboratory. "Look upon my works, ye mighty, and despair"." At first, I thought that saying meant others would despair in knowing they couldn't compare. Then in my foolishness, I became the Ozymandias of the poem. "Look on my Works, ye Mighty, and despair!  Nothing beside remains. Round the decay, of that colossal Wreck, boundless and bare, the lone and level sands stretch far away." 

Another door. A supply closet. Neil was trying very hard not to listen, but it was becoming difficult. Chara's whispering was getting louder. A resentful anger was building in him, rising higher and higher. 

"Everything I did amounted to nothing. What went up came down. Because I began using my gifts to experiment upon humans. I used it to discover the infamous "LOVE". "Level of Violence". To discover "EXP". "Execution Points". I learned the limits of monster and human souls. I learned what happens when a monster claims a human soul. Because I was the one that sparked the war. Humans found out about my experiments, found out I had absorbed human souls into myself to test what would happen. And we were cast down, down, down...into the Underground."  
  
"Oh, I feel so BAD for you. Wallow in self-pity you child-killing sons of!-" Neil began to angrily say. "Do you expect me to feel SORRY for you?! After everything you've done to the missus here? To the other children? To ME? Do you know how many times I died down here in the Underground? Against Asgore alone? When you've died over 89 times, then maybe we can talk about how much we've both suffered, how much we have in common!" 

He shook his head back and forth, finally reaching the last door on the right, opening it up. Coffee!...on a desk, next to some monster versions of "Oreos". It wasn't an employee lounge, it was a small employee office, and...an absolute wreck. There were papers littering the ground, posters half-heartedly stuck up on the wall, the PC was a mess, a dozen different applications were turned on and various scribblings and doodles were left on a nearby whiteboard...and Neil knew it was Sans's. The scribbler was supposed to analyze velocity, and to do so, he'd drawn a cannon firing. The cannon had then turned into a pirate firing said cannon at a fort as he sat on a tiny island, sharks circling around his nearby pirate ship as he cried out "Yar, Yar, Gimme Yer Treasure", the Fort defiantly firing back and yelling "Never" as a crab scuttled on the beach it laid upon. Yep. It was definitely Sans's scribbling. He hobbled Bonnie over to the desk as she took the Oreo cookies and downed them with the coffee, her wounds healing a bit before his eyes, her skin no longer looking quite as gaunt, her bloodied wounds being more scabby and less flowing, more color coming to her cheeks. 

"Your kind killed many, many of us." Gaster explained softly over the PDA. "And we so dearly want to leave this place. Don't make this difficult. I have enough blood on my conscience, and do not want to cause more needless suffering if I can avoid it."  
  
"You want to go up and kill more people on the surface. That's not okay. I don't care what you endured in the past, it doesn't justify you being jerks in the present." Neil snapped. "It's the same sort of nonsense my dad used to buy into when he was on that big Confederate kick for a while. He got over it because he realized what you haven't yet. You wanna remember? Fine. REMEMBER THAT YOU LOST. Then maybe the days of glory past stop looking so awesome." 

"Don't antagonize the guy who can shoot lasers outta giant skulls. Cuz he'll use 'em. Repeatedly. Many, many times." Bonnie grunted, shaking her head back and forth as she led HIM out of the room, down along the dark hallway as the air seemed to get humid and intense. Further and further along the dimly-lit hall they went, approaching the only door out, the other locked and barred by thick, steely grates as Neil forcibly tug it open...

He deeply frowned. This place. 

He was in the middle of a part of the lab he'd not enjoyed being close to at ALL the last time he'd gone through the Underground, in what seemed like another lifetime ago. This was where the Amalgamates were. Deep, ugly green floors, a rotten wall color to match, what sounded like a thousand fans all running at once as he and Bonnie kept moving forward, through darkness and a hazy mist that spread through the room, enveloping all nooks and crannies. It was almost icy cold inside this tomb-like section of the lab, and Neil shuddered, somehow this place felt even more inhospitable to his tutu-wearing frame than SNOWDIN had! 

And then the mist parted enough to reveal Dr. Gaster who was standing with his hands in his lab coat. His head was lowered as he quietly sighed. 

"I will ask you politely only once. Please return to the cell with her, and this will not be painful."  
  
"I'll ask YOU once. Move out of the way, or I move you." Neil said, getting in front of Bonnie as he parted his legs a bit and struck a fighting pose, crouching a bit, ready to spring forth. 

Dr. Gaster sighed. "I didn't want to do this. My green energy's rather spent from my earlier fight with the teenager behind you. I had hoped you'd just cooperate, but you humans are so...DETERMINED, aren't you? As long as you keep moving forward, trying as hard as you can, you believe everything will work out."  
  
"DETERMINATION?" Neil grinned, flexing his legs. "Nah! I was all about INTEGRITY. Owning up to what I do, to be honest and true. You'll not get any lies out of me, doc. So believe me when I say I REALLY am not gonna hold back against you after what you did to Bonnie!" 

Chara's whispering had never sounded so seductive. Gaster and Mettaton had hurt Bonnie. They deserved to be punished for this, for hurting an innocent human. For hurting one of his friends. For trying to keep a mother from her child. They refused to own up to the wrong they did, excusing it as a "greater good". 

He HATED that excuse. And they were going to find out just how much he hated it. He shot forward, Gaster sighing as his head shot up...and distinctly glowed a deep blue. Neil was caught off guard, blinking a bit in surprise, the leg that was about to slide into Gaster's face flopping a bit in midair...

Before Neil flopped to the floor, now covered in a blue aura as Gaster chuckled a bit. "In the words of my adorable younger brother...you're blue now. That's my attack. Nyeh-heh-heh-heh!"

Neil inwardly gasped as Dr. Gaster swung his finger through the air, spinning it around and around as Neil was swept to and fro through the air, Bonnie gaping in alarm and staring in shock. Neil was taking a beating, his young body slamming hard into the wall as Dr. Gaster frowned. "I suggest you surrender before I'm forced to-"

**RESET**

"As long as you keep moving forward, trying as hard as you can, you believe everything will-" 

Neil's leg shot forth as he tried to knee Dr. Gaster straight in his face with a THWA-THWACK...only for Dr. Gaster to freeze him in midair, Neil stiffening, halting in place, now looking positively idiotic as he hung there, Gaster chuckling. "You're blue now! That's my attack! Nyeh-heh-heh!"  
  
"Oh COME ON!" Neil cried out angrily. 

**RESET**

"I will ask you politely only once. Please return to the cell with her, and this will not be painful-"

"Oh trust me, this is gonna be real painful!" Neil roared out, barreling down the hallway, only for to be slammed into the wall, his body engulfed by blue light. "Don't tell me. I'm "blue" now. That's your attack. Nyeh-heh-heh?" 

Dr. Gaster blinked stupidly. "Wait, how-oh. Of course, your unique ability. You can...Reset, I imagine? I've experience in these matters. You're not the first time-fiddling human I ever met. It would seem you're going to be the last, though. Believe me, I am very sorry for your death." He insisted, holding a hand up. 

**RESET**

Neil was now in the hallway with Bonnie and he halted in place, panting. "Wait. WAIT." He insisted firmly. "If we go down this way, Dr. Gaster will cream me. I can't beat him." Neil groaned as he clutched at his head, shaking it back and forth. "What am I going to do?! I can't think of a way to attack him and there's no other way out of here!" 

Bonnie laid against the wall, folding her arms. She quietly bobbed her head, thinking...thinking. "Listen. I got me an idea. Can he handle the both of us?"  
  
"He's got two hands, so I imagine "yes"." Neil grunted with a shake of his head.

"Then we need another way out. We need to blow our way out, if need be." She reasoned. "Isn't there a laboratory door near here? Someplace with stuff that goes "boom"?"   
  
"The only place that has that stuff is in that big misty section of lab up ahead, and GASTER'S in there." 

"...then follow my lead." Bonnie whispered, inching towards the doorway...then getting low, low...and sloooowly pushing open the door. She began to crawl along the ground as the mist began to seep out and fill the hallway. Neil held his breath harshly, his heart pounding in his chest as they inched slowly along the floor, hearing a thoughtful humming noise filling the air as they inched along the right-hand wall. Not a word. Neither of them would say one...single...word. 

Silence reigned over them, the mist filling every nook and cranny of the laboratory as Dr. Gaster looked around, seeing nothing. The mist hung low all around him, obscuring the floor and a good two feet above it as he frowned slightly, displeasure on his skeletal face. "Child, you can't hide from me forever. It would be better for you to come out. I want this to be over with quickly, so as to ensure there is less suffering."

Neil felt that anger rising in him. He felt he was being condescended to and he hated that. That awful muttering of Chara's was rising in his soul, that urge to lash out, to hurt, to make this hypocrite standing on a false moral pedestal SHUT UP. But he had to listen to Bonnie, she knew what she was doing, if he could just stay quiet long enough...

Then she stopped him, putting a hand on his arm. She pointed forward, across the floor. There, sure enough, was a large, flammable mixture of chemicals with the obvious warning signs on it. And if they could just move it over towards a window on the far side of the lab...

Nodding quietly in agreement, they slunk towards the big jar of chemicals, one of many, and Neil got an idea. Taking in a deep breath as he heard Dr. Gaster speak again, ensuring what he wanted to do would be muffled by the talking, he took another jaw and placed it on its side on the floor, then...

"Come out, child. I'll try to be as gentle as I can when I take your soul, the touch of death need not be cold-"

RATTLE-RATTLE-RATTLE. Gaster wheeled around, seeing something rolling across the floor at a swift speed and he quickly moved after it, picking it up as Bonnie kept pushing the chemical jar. Neil, meanwhile, had snatched up several other bottles and was now rolling them around the floor of the lab from different parts of the room, all in different directions, barreling away and scurrying across the ground like a lab rat, hidden by the mist. All of this was providing a misleading picture for Gaster, making him unsure which direction they were, which direction the rolling vials of chemicals were coming from. 

Closer and closer to the wall with the window came Bonnie and the big vial of chemicals as she finally put it against it and tilted it up. Now they just had to blow it up. They needed fire. Luckily...she kept a lighter in a hidden pocket in her boots, along with a tiny knife. They'd taken her gun. Taken her bullets. But they hadn't done a full search of her. Heck, she would have hidden something in her PANTIES if she hadn't considered herself a "classy gal". 

Smirking a bit, she turned back to Neil and nodded. Time for a distraction. She began to caaarefully rip off a piece of her undershirt, to make a makeshift wick as she uncorked the chemical vial and eased the wick into it, Neil scurrying as far away from her as possible, waiting for Gaster to speak again, waiting for him to be fully distracted.

"Okay, Gaster. Let's talk." Neil said quietly, rising up, fists resting on his hips as the skeletal monster faced him down and blinked slowly. 

"So, human. At last you feel up for a more civil discussion?" Gaster inquired. 

"Do you know what it feels like to die?" Neil asked quietly. Quiet, with an edge. Gaster felt a sense of unease on him as an almost...red glint...came to Neil's eyes. "It was agonizing. A horrific, sudden stabbing. Your organs bursting, filling with fire from inside. You just want it to stop. You'll give anything for it to just...stop. And it doesn't stop. So you scream. And you scream. And then even after that, after your voice is hoarse and your throat raw and you're sobbing endlessly, it doesn't stop until the very...last...breath...comes from your lungs. It was hell." 

Gaster was silent for a long...long time, it seemed. Unaware of the wick getting burned up...of Bonnie slinking from the wall...

"That was how it felt to die. The first time. Imagine that over and over." Neil muttered. "And I have tried SO hard not to be...mad." Neil grumbled out. "To...to not give back as good as I get. Because I 'got' a lot. A lot of it I earned, for I hurt a lot of monsters that didn't deserve it, but I also saw plenty of other children die in the other timelines I watched. Kids who didn't deserve to die, who just wanted to go home, and wanted you monsters to stop hurting them, but you wouldn't listen."  
  
"We all believe our greater good is the greatest, I suppose." Gaster confessed. "It is no excuse. I just wish for you to understand."  
  
"I understand. But you want to kill us, and..." Neil held his head in his hands. "...I am SO angry with what you did to Bonnie. I want to make things right, Dr. Gaster. I'm getting her out of here and taking her and her son home. Where they belong. And you're not going to stop me."  
  
"Oh?" Gaster looked a bit amused. "My dear child, however do you think you are going to stop me? I'm getting a sense of deja vu. You and I have spoken before, and I imagine you didn't beat me then."  
  
"I don't need to beat you. I just gotta distract you." Neil said, gesturing at the wall behind Gaster as the skeletal doctor whipped around, eyes wide as he finally noticed the burning wick falling into the chemicals. 

With a loud, raucous SHA-KOOOOWWW, the wall and the large canister and the chemicals exploded in fire, Dr. Gaster being thrown back as an opening was blown forth, Gaster flying across the lab as Bonnie and Neil ran through it, along the dark reddish/brown ground and towards a catwalk, eager to get to the elevator, to race back to the river, away from Hotland, off towards Snowdin and the Ruins!

The elevator was only about fifty feet away. Neil began to press the button summoning it as Bonnie looked back, seeing something that filled her with shock. Her eyes went wide. The entire laboratory was quickly catching on fire. The explosion had cracked a very weak section of ground and...it was falling into the lava. "We can't just leave them there!" She cried out, her eyes full of alarm. As horrific and cruel as they'd treated her...she couldn't leave them to die. Before Neil could stop her, Bonnie had barreled off towards the burning entrance and he groaned, covering his face.

"Tug her back. Force her to come back with you." 

"...noooo." Neil murmured. "Sans can teleport out fine, I'm sure but...Alphys is still in there and my dad would never forgive me if I just let a girl get hurt." He confessed, barreling after Bonnie, seeing her lifting up a moaning, barely-awake Dr. Gaster. "I'm going to go find Alphys." He insisted to her as she nodded, making for the exit they'd formed, racing along the halls as the laboratory shook and shuddered, and the fire began to rise. Bits of flames were licking along the walls as he saw Sans escorting laboratory experiments along down another hallway, turning down a left path...

There she was! She was dragging Mettaton's robot body...rather poorly. It was clear she couldn't carry him. "Come on, we need to go!" Neil yelled out, racing at her. "This place is collapsing!"  
  
"Are you kidding me!?" She snapped, looking angrily at him. "This is your fault, isn't it? I'm not going with you! You probably did this to Mettaton too!" She added, pointing back at the unconscious robot, the heat in the halls rising higher, higher, higher...

"HAHAHAHAHAHAHA!"

Horrific, soulcrushing laughter. Suddenly vines wrapped around Alphys and Mettaton's forms, Mettaton's robotic body shuddering and shattering, leaving a stunned-looking pinkish GHOST now trapped inside the vine tendrils engulfing her as Neil stared in alarm, seeing a smug, smirking flowery face looking down at him. "I knew I was right to follow you around. Knew that if I just waited, I'd get my chance. And while all of you were trying to escape the mess this idiot and his stupid friend made..." Flowey sniggered, looking at Neil, then at Alphys and Mettaton. "I got the human souls you had! My, my, my, I feel WONDERFUL with them inside me. Of course...I could use more." He added darkly, sneering at Neil. "Thank you so much for blowing a nice hole open for me. Now do me another favor..."

He held up a spiked vine and launched it at Neil, who's mouth fell open in a gasp as he barely rolled away, the burning flames blocking off his exit back, the only way forward now blocked by a huge swarm of vines, Flowey and horrific spiky shrubbery...

  
"AND DIE!" 


	8. Where Chains Shall Never Bind You...

Frisk couldn't believe what he was staring at. It was one of the most horrifying things he'd ever seen. Alphys and Mettaton were trapped within the spiked tendrils, a horrifyingly grim, cackling flowery face in the middle of green leaves, eyes glittering like dark coals as he cackled insanely, his body bulging and expanding, a secondary mouth spreading out of some kind of pinkish flesh as thick "arms" formed out of horrific vines with spiky "claws", the head twitching ever-so-slightly, like a cracked watch who's arms couldn't reach the right time...

And the spiky vine-like tendril arms were rising up, trying to slam into him.

He had arrived just in time to see Neil flopping loosely from one of the tendril arms, Bonnie hanging from another...

His MOTHER hanging loosely from another tendril, Flowey's face split wide with horrific laughter. What looked like a gigantic ZIT of some kind was forming on his forehead, pulsing and growing larger and larger, yet square in design as monsters nearby looked about at each other in confusion.

What were they supposed to do? What COULD they do? The human was right there, ALL of the humans were right there and yet this...this horrific THING was right in front of them as well, with the Second Royal Scientist trapped in a curly vine, a ghost monster in another as the two other royal scientists stood nearby, bony jaws agape.

"S-Should we...do something?" The young Monster Kid, Huey, whispered out. "U-Undyne? A-Aren't you gonna..."

"You're damn RIGHT I'm gonna do something!" Undyne roared out, forcibly shoving Frisk to the side as she spun her hand about, a burning icy blue spear forming. She thrust her other hand forward as blue arrows manifested high above her head, and Sans and Gaster glanced at each other, then at Papyrus who was watching out in the crowd of monsters that had gathered at the laboratory when it had started to go up in flames.

"Asgore. Get Asgore." Gaster insisted to Sans. "Teleport to him immediately. Papyrus, protect the crowd! We will handle this...THING." He growled, rising up. Though much of his magic was gone, he still had enough reserves to try and take on this monstrosity, and his eyes glowed with a foul Purple aura. Perseverance was normally a "neutral" type of ability, a sibling of the trait of Determination just as Justice was. Determination was all about continuing to face the future, and Perseverance too valued giving it your all. Determination always sought to do what it believed was right, Perseverance sought to continue to move forward, no matter how hard it was...

The difference was that in the name of Perseverance, it was easy to get carried away, to take shortcuts, to...take the easy, and cruel way out if it meant being able to move forward. And with furious, baleful roars, Gaster flexed his arms, sweeping them down as mighty skeletal heads manifested high above, firing off purple beams of energy.

But the "zit" on Flowey's head sprung open as he began to cackle again, a television now forming, showing off a mockingly laughing face as his secondary mouth opened up, another beam slamming into the twin strikes of purple Gaster formed. They met in midair, the two seemingly evenly matched as Frisk ran forward, barreling at Flowey, armed with a gardening knife that Toriel had given him, a little band-aid still on her arm from a cut he'd gotten earlier as Flowey sneered down upon the child, mocking, twisted singing ringing from the television screen's black and white spectral face...

_**You climb and then you make your way in!** _   
_**Inside...you know that I'll be waiting!** _   
_**First crawl to see that you can make it,** _   
_**They say that you're the one with what it...** _   
_**taaaaakes to...brave this...world of...darkness!** _

Flowey launched a thick arm at Frisk, who dived beneath it as a set of vines shot at Gaster. Gaster held up his holey palms, the skeletal heads slamming their jaws down on the vines, trying to tug them apart as he growled and panted, sweat beginning to bead up on his skull. Meanwhile, the arrows of Undyne had shot through the air, but Flowey was batting them away with his other thick viney arm, sneering at her as he launched ANOTHER burning beam from his secondary mouth. She dove to the side, Papyrus spreading his arms wide as thick bluish bones manifested, forming a shield to protect the crowd Flowey had ALMOST hit.

_**Encounters with many beasts you've not seen!** _   
_**Tricks and traps leave your head spinning!** _   
_**Nightmare fuel that keeps you running,** _   
_**Shadows crawling on the ceiling!** _   
_**Home where ghosts dwell; hope you slept weeeeeell!** _

He lifted his other arm and now slammed them both down at Frisk, who leapt to the side, then leapt ONTO one of the viney arms, racing at Flowey's face as a vine managed to snatch hold of Gaster, sneaking around him and tossing him into Undyne. They almost flew off into the magma below, Gaster barely managing to hold on as Alphys moaned, trying to tug herself free from another vine whilst Bonnie weakly stirred, looking up, seeing poor Neil was barely conscious and heavily bleeding, clearly only mere minutes from death. "Neil, y-ya...gotta get up..."

"I...I can't...feel my...legs..." He whispered. "Everything hurts so much." He murmured. His soul was visibly manifesting, the blue heart shape flickering on and off, aware of the faintly pulsing Souls of the OTHER unfortunate human children were trapped inside poor Flowey. He could feel them distinctly, pulsing like heartbeats within Flowey's mutated body, Patience, Bravery, Perseverance, Kindness...four innocent human souls all stuck. And soon to be joined by many monster souls, and three MORE human child.

Undyne flopped onto the reddish ground with W.D Gaster, growling angrily up at Flowey.

"Come on now, we gotta gather round him! Think up some tricks to make his head spin!"

"My beams will have your eyes a-melting!" Gaster roared out angrily, slamming his hands into the ground beneath as another skeletal head formed, firing off a powerful magical laser beam right at Flowey. Flowey then sneered...moving Mettaton right in front of the beam. Realizing what he was doing, Gaster quickly spread his arms wide, the skull fading, the beam fading away, just BARELY dissolving away before it hit Mettaton as Flowey dangled his "hostages" in the air, Frisk barely avoiding a strike at Alphys, who had been thrust in front of HIM to keep Frisk from attacking Flowey.

"You coward!" Frisk screamed out. "YOU COWARD!" He yelled, trying to tug Alphys free of the vine that was wrapped around Alphys, being tossed back...Sans popping up, catching him as Asgore stood behind the fat skeleton, furiously glaring, trident held high.

"Careful that you don't hit that phantom!" Hapstablook cried out, seeing the panic in his cousin's eyes as the little ghost quivered in fear, Flowey laughing cruelly.

**_"You can't! Light this! World of! Darkneeeeess!"_** He cried out, and BELCHED, as ugly, foul black smog barreled forth from his multiple jaws. Everyone coughed and spluttered and hacked and wheezed, drowned in the darkness, choking on the black as Flowey's mocking singing continued to drift through the air.

**_You heed the ever sounding calling!  
You need...to know your world is falling!_ **

A vine smacked hard into Frisk, knocking the child to his knees as he heard the unmistakable sound of whipping filling the air, Flowey was torturing the other poor unfortunates trapped within the dark fog.

_**'Hero' is what they've all been saying!**_  
 _ **But this world, it isn't worth the saving!**_  
 _ **Got to! Earn it! All that couraaaaage!**_  
  
"I'm! N-not scared of you!" Frisk roared out, staring up, up into now piercingly-foul reddish eyes spreading across the television screen face that Flowey had grown, which had spread to engulf his normal visage. The horrific double maw was stretched out before him, Flowey cackling madly over and over.

**_Accept it doesn't even matter!_ **

Another vine shot forth, Frisk diving away...

**_'Hero' is what they've all been saying!_ **

But now a thick viney ARM slammed him into the ground, Flowey sneering coldly at him.

_**Give up on "happy ever after"!**_  
 _ **This world, it isn't worth the saving!**_  
  
"I don't believe that!" Frisk yelled out, another vine rising high, the end spiky and foul, intending to impale the poor child.

**_"This world, it isn't worth the saving!"_** Flowey screeched out. But Frisk dug his knife into the arm holding him down, making Flowey let go out of an instinctual reaction to pain, Frisk swiftly rolling away as he held the knife high and the fog began to fade away, the others all lying on the grounds of Hotland, struggling to try and rise.

Gaster was barely conscious, panting heavily as he clutched his side, milky blood oozing freely from his wound as Sans gently helped Undyne up, the panting-heavily heroine frowning. She held up a shaking arm, a single feeble "spear" that was more like a dart shooting at Flowey in midair. It pitifully flopped against his face as he smirked at her.

_**Your sight is falling short and narrow** _   
_**Much like your little would-be arrow!** _   
_**Close to breaking...you can't take this!** _

He then shot his thick viney arms at them, slamming them into the ground, laughing coldly as he began to SQUEEZE, trying to crush them...

**_Population down to zero!  
This world, it doesn't need a hero!_ **

"Now I'll earn it...all my courage..." Frisk murmured, seeing his mother waving a shaky arm. He looked up, and saw her pointing at the lab...where other canisters were lying open in exploded-open sections of walls, and having the "danger, flammable" warning on them. An idea came to him as he turned, seeing Asgore trying to rise up. He barreled over to him, helping the mighty King up, Asgore looking shamefully at him.

"You have no obligation to help me after all I've done to you and your kind." Asgore murmured sadly. "I am ashamed of my words and deeds beyond measure."

"I just need you to keep distracting him. There's still some big, explosive stuff in the lab, I wanna use it." Frisk said. "Can you stall him?"

"I will do my darndest, dear one." Asgore promised. He nodded firmly at Frisk, launching himself through the air, Flowey gasping in surprise as the Trident of Asgore sank into his frame and he forcibly released Undyne and Gaster, Papyrus racing over to them, pulling them to safety, trying to get some of his spaghetti into their mouths in a vain attempt to heal them.

Asgore stabbed into Flowey's frame over and over, his trident burning with fiery energy as Frisk barreled into the laboratory, and he held aloft one of the explosive canisters. He placed it on the ground, one after another, then kicked them, making them roll towards Flowey...

Who had snatched at Asgore with one of his vines, holding him among his OTHER hostages, and was now tightly squeezing them all as he sneered and continued to mockingly sing.

**_Accept it doesn't even matter!_ **   
**_'Hero' is what they've all been saying!_ **   
**_Give up on happy ever after!_ **   
**_This world, it isn't worth the saving!_ **   
**_This world, it isn't worth the saving!_ **   
**_THIS WORLD, IT ISN'T WORTH THE SAV-_ **

Then he felt the canisters roll into his body, turning around, looking down, his facial expression confused as Asgore growled evilly, and pointed his trident at the canisters. "BURN!" He commanded.

The canisters exploded, burning, horrific fire bathing over Flowey's frame as he was sent reeling, flopping about, howling madly as he was forced to drop his hostages. Sans gasped, focusing his powers as he popped in and out of midair, teleporting the moments-from-falling-into-lava forms of Alphys and Bonnie to the ground as Neil flopped near Asgore, Mettaton managing to soar away as Flowey wailed and wailed. His body continued to burn as Bonnie's face showed a grin, her final moments those of a proud smile at her dear child, Frisk...

Flowey sank into the lava, wailing and screaming and howling as Frisk looked mournfully down at him. "HELP ME! PLEASE! PLEASE!"

"I wish I could." Frisk murmured out. "...I really wish I could."

But he knew he couldn't. He had made his choices, and he had to live with it. And Flowey had made his. If he hadn't done this, he wouldn't be dying the way he was now. He saw the human souls in Flowey flicker and shift...and then SHOT forth, blazing forward, soaring high out of Flowey's body, rebelling at last now that he was weak and dying, and soaring over...to Bonnie's still frame. Frisk only had eyes for her as he slowly moved over to her still form, Neil panting a bit as he slowly rose from the ground and hobbled over to him.

"I am so, so sorry." He murmured out to Frisk, hanging his head. "If I hadn't screwed this up, she'd...I was so close to getting her out, I..."

"You couldn't have known what Flowey was gonna do." Frisk tried to say, though his voice was cracking and pained, everyone slowly walking over to them, kneeling or crouching down to the young boy's form as he laid on his by his dead mother. "I...I just..." He covered his face, taking in deep, painful breaths. "I don't f-feel so good..." He began to whimper out as Toriel began to emerge from behind the crowd, approaching young Frisk.

The child felt her gently stroke over his back, his comforting motherly voice speaking tenderly. "There, there. It's alright." She insisted as Asgore hung his head, looking pained, knowing what she was about to say even before she said it. "I understand the pain you are going through. When I lost my own children, I-"

**"OH SHUUUUT UUUUPP!"** A furious voice wailed out as they turned around, gasping at Flowey, barely clinging to the edge of a Hotland cliff with a vine-like protuberance that was fading away as the last of his mighty power began to leave him. "You think YOU'RE the one who suffered?! Try waking up and realizing you lost your soul after dying in front of your mother and father!"

"Asriel, stop it." Neil said angrily, everyone stiffening, some people gasping and holding their hands over their mouths, Asgore's eyes bugging out wide as Alphys gazed at Neil in surprise, Gaster slowly opening his mouth as Sans's sockets turned black...and Toriel felt hot tears spring her eyes.

"How did you...?" She asked in a whisper.

"When you can turn back the clock, you can learn a lot. Answers to math tests...when a bully will try and trip you walking down the hall...what happened to the Crown Prince of the Underground." Neil said as he faced down Flowey, who was furiously glaring, a tiny fire alit on a leaf petal, even as bullets began to form over his little frame. "Flowey is...what happened to Asriel. His dust got spread on the flowers he'd loved so much, and one of said flowers was injected with Determination...the power of the Human Soul, thanks to Alphys. It "woke" Asriel up, but...as that."

He gestured at Asriel...at Flowey. "And he doesn't have a Soul. That's why he hurts people. It's just like why Chara kept asking me to hurt people when I met her." Neil whispered. "She had lost her soul when she died, and...she was just a shell of whatever she'd been, and that's all she and Asriel are now. Shells. Don't...th-think of them as your son and daughter anymore, Mr. and Mrs. Dreemurr." Neil murmured. "Those two died a long time ago."

"You ruined EVERYTHING! I thought you being here with her would make it interesting, but all you did was ruin my fun!" Flowey screamed. "Why couldn't you just let me play?!"

"Because I played your game before..." Neil growled, as he made his choice, and shot forward, hands held high. "AND IT WASN'T FUN THE FIRST TIME!"

Flowey let out a snarl as he fired the bullets, the tiny white pellets shooting forth with a whiz through the air, but Neil ignored it. To them, they were as pinpricks, he'd been beaten half-to-death by Flowey, impaled by spiky vines, wrapped in harsh rose-thorn esque tendrils and was probably suffering from heavy internal bleeding...he barely felt the blows on his body. And he wasn't going to let Frisk or anyone else have this on their conscience. He was the one with an increased LV. He was going to be the one to bear this load.

He wouldn't let Flowey hurt anyone else. Flowey had hurt Frisk. Had...hurt...Bonnie. Had ruined **everything** because he was so selfish and soulless and cruel.

Neil couldn't forgive him.

His hands flew forward even as he flopped down onto Hotland's hard, rocky surface, grasping Flowey, who gasped in alarm, realizing that even NOW Neil was not giving up...

And Neil forcibly crunched his fists tightly around Flowey, who's muffled scream was silenced...and then Neil let go. Flowey's dead, torn frame flopped loose from his palms as Neil Elliot's chest slooowly rose and fell, and he flopped on his side, staring back at the others as they all raced towards him, realizing he was soon to die...

He didn't mind. Not this time. He had used the RESET to escape from Death and pain over and over. But not now. He closed his eyes, and far from being overwhelmed by darkness and cold, he could see naught but light feel nothing but warmth. The soft touch of many Souls was brushing against his own, as he knew what he had to do. One last piece of advice to give...one last favor to do.

"We'll...be at...the barrier. G-Get...everyone...to it..." Neil whispered. "EVERYONE..."

Frisk's eyes went wide. But...he understood, turning to King Asgore and Toriel, nodding. "Get all the monsters to the Barrier. Now. Please. The Souls have room for...one more trick." He added, his voice beginning to crack. "Before they say...before they say..."

"Goodbye." Neil finished, his eyes closing, as he felt Bonnie's hand upon his own...felt himself being lifted up, soaring through the air, towards the castle ramparts off in the distance.

_**Come with meeeee...** _   
_**Where chains will never biiiind yoooou!** _   
_**All your grief...At last, at last behind you!** _

Towards a stretch of wide white, a doorway of strange soft light that allowed none but humans to pass through, or those that possessed human souls...towards the Barrier that separated Monsterkind from humans.  
**_  
Take my haaand...I'll lead you to salvaaation!_**

Monster hands grasped in one. Skeletal upon skeletal, clawed in clawed, finned in finned. One by one, all of them had made their way to the barrier, now standing before it, Frisk clutching the hands of Toriel and Asgore on either side of him, feeling their warm, soft grip as his own tears trickled down his cheeks. He could see his mother even now, glimmering just beyond the white veil before him, just in front of the barrier, pressing upon it with a hand...  
  
_**Take my love! For looove is everlaaaasting!**_  
 _ **And remember...the truth that once was spoken!**_  
 _ **To love another person is to see the face...of Goooooood!**_

"It's time." Frisk whispered, and they all began to sing, and step towards the barrier, marching onward, the barrier stretching...STREEETCHING...

**_Do you hear the people sing...lost in the valley of the night?  
It is the music of a people, who are climbing to the light!_ **

_**For the wretched of the earth, there is a flame that never dies.** _  
_**Even the darkest night will end, and the sun will rise!** _  
_**Whey will live again in freedom, in the garden of the Lord!** _  
_**We will walk behind the ploughshare;** _  
_**We will put away the sword!** _  
_**The chain will be broken,** _  
_**And all men will have their rewaaaard!** _

Many miles below Mount Ebott, people turned their heads, tilting it slightly. "Do...do you hear that...?"

"It...sort of sounds like...singing?"

"Yeah, it...it can't be..."

Eyes rising high, gazing in surprise, some in alarm, others in amazement, seeing the forms rising out from the mountain's deep recesses...

**_Will you join in our crusade?_ **   
**_Who will be strong and stand with me?_ **   
**_Somewhere beyond the barricade,_ **   
**_Is there a world you long to see?_ **   
**_Do you hear the people sing?_ **   
**_Say, do you hear the distant drums?_ **   
**_It is the future that they bring when tomorrow coooomes!_ **

**_Will you join in our crusade?_ **   
**_Who will be strong and stand with me?_ **   
**_Somewhere beyond the barricade,_ **   
**_Is there a world you long to see?_ **   
**_Do you hear the people sing?_ **   
**_Say, do you hear the distant drums?_ **   
**_It is the future that they bring when tomorrow coooomes!_ **

Neil had never felt so light...so happy...so free.

And neither had monsterkind.

**_Tomorrow cooooooomes!_ **


End file.
